SILC Module on the Impact of Childhood Poverty Experiences on Adult Life 2023

The Survey on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) is an annual European Union (EU) survey which collects data on income, poverty, social exclusion, and living conditions of individuals and households in EU member states. The survey is regulated by legislations. As part of the annual SILC core variables covering certain topics such as income are collected every year. In addition to the annual variables, the SILC includes variables collected via modules. Some modules are repeated every three years (e.g., ‘Health’ and ‘Children’). Others are repeated every six years. One such module that is collected every six years is ‘Intergenerational transmission of advantages and disadvantages and housing difficulties’. This module was conducted as part of the 2023 SILC and module questions were restricted to survey participants aged 25-59 years old. Eurostat (the statistical office of the European Union) has published Intergenerational transmission of disadvantages - statistics, which presents cross country data on how early socio-economic conditions shape current conditions.

Poverty rates published for Ireland by Eurostat differ from those published nationally by the Central Statistics Office. The reason for the different rates is due to methodological differences in how poverty rates are calculated nationally and how Eurostat calculates poverty rates. In addition to results published for each EU member state, Eurostat also published data for some non-EU countries such as Norway, Switzerland and Türkiye, countries who participate in the SILC on a voluntary basis.

At risk of poverty rate higher for people who experienced a bad household financial situation around age 14

As already mentioned in Chapter 2:‘Poverty and Deprivation ’ the at risk of poverty rate was higher for 25-59 year olds who experienced a bad household financial situation when they were around 14 years old. Overall, in the European Union, one in five (20.0%) of 25-59 year olds who considered their household's financial situation as ‘bad’ when they were 14 years old were at risk of poverty in 2023. The Eurostat report shows that for EU countries, Bulgaria (48.1%) and Romania (42.1%) had the highest at risk of poverty rates for those who considered their household's financial situation as ‘bad’ when they were around 14 years old. The comparable rate for Irish respondents aged 25-59 was 12.0%. Czechia (9.5%) and Denmark (8.5%) had the lowest poverty rates for people who experienced a bad household financial situation when they were around 14 years old. For those who considered their household's financial situation to have been good, the highest at risk of poverty rates were for Spain (16.6%), Greece, Latvia (both 14.9%) and Romania (14.6%). The lowest poverty rates for people who experienced a good household financial situation when they were around 14 years old were in Czechia (6.2%), Hungary (7.5%), Belgium and Ireland (both 7.7%).

Analysis of the difference in the at risk of poverty rates between those who considered their household's financial situation to have been good and bad when they were around 14 years old shows that the largest differences were in Bulgaria (33.7 percentage points) and Romania (27.5 percentage points), while Denmark was the only country where the at risk of poverty rate was slightly lower for those who considered their household's financial situation to have been bad. The at risk of poverty percentage point difference between Irish respondents who considered their teenage household financial situation as good (7.7% of respondents) and those who considered their financial situation as bad (12.0% of respondents) was 4.3 percentage points. See Table 6.1 for poverty rated for a selected group of European countries and Intergenerational transmission of disadvantages - statistics for data on all SILC participant countries.

At risk of poverty rate was lower for people with highly educated parents

Across the EU, the highest at risk of poverty rates for persons aged 25-59 years whose parents had lower education levels were recorded in Romania (40.8%) and Bulgaria (39.2%). The lowest rates were in Denmark (7.4%) and Finland (8.8%). The comparable rate for Irish respondents was 13.7%. For people whose parents had upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education, the highest poverty rates were in Latvia (15.7%), Estonia (14.6%) and Lithuania (14.5%), while the lowest were in Czechia (4.7%), Ireland, and Hungary (both 6.4%). See Table 6.2 for poverty rates for a selected group of European countries and Intergenerational transmission of disadvantages - statistics for data on all SILC participant countries