By IANS/EFE,
Madrid : The National Statistics Institute, or INE, said Thursday that 21.8 percent of Spain’s population lives under the poverty line, exceeding the poverty rate of 20.7 percent in 2010 and 19.5 percent in 2009.
Those at greatest risk of living in poverty are children under 16 years of age, according to the INE, which emphasised that the poverty rate among this group had risen “from 23.3 percent in 2009 to 26.5 percent in 2011”.
The institute said that 26.1 percent of Spanish homes said that it is “difficult” or “very difficult” for them – with 9.7 percent of them placing themselves in the latter category – to make it to the end of the month on their available funds, although this figure was better than in 2010, when 30.6 percent of households in the country reported problems of this kind.
The survey also revealed that 35.9 percent of Spanish households said that they do not have the ability to meet unforeseen expenditures in 2011, compared to 36.7 percent in 2010, and 38.8 percent of the homes cannot afford to go on a week’s vacation, a similar percentage to 2010 and 2009 and 5.3 percentage points higher than in 2008.
The INE also found that 6.1 percent of Spanish homes were behind in their payments for their main living quarters – including mortgage or rent and utilities – in the two months prior to the survey, that is between March and June 2011.
According to the survey, the average annual income per Spanish household in 2010 – the latest available figure – was 24,890 euros (about $34,000), a drop of 4.4 percent compared with the previous year.
In 2010, average per capita income stood at 9,371 euros (about $12,800), a level 3.8 percent below that registered in 2009.
The INE sets the poverty level at 60 percent of the median income per consumption unit, in this case a household.
Thus, for a home with one adult, the poverty level is 7,533 euros; for a home with two adults, it is 11,300 euros (or 5,650 euros per person); for a household with two adults and a 14-year-old child, it stands at 13,560 euros (or 4,520 euros per person), and for a home with two adults and two children, it is set at 15,820 euros (or 3,955 euros per person).