Inequality and poverty – what action is being taken by Member States?

24 May 2017
by Catherine MALLET

The 2017 Joint Employment Report adopted on 3 March 2017, provide a snapshot of recent employment and social policies implemented in Member States in line with the Employment Guidelines.

EU socio-economic analysts and statisticians have analyzed in particular developments in income inequality and poverty evidenced in the report, and the policy efforts that have been made to reduce them. Overall, the highest income inequalities are observed in Romania, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Spain, Latvia and Greece.

According to the report, in 2016 Member States took a number of actions to address the issues of income inequality and poverty including:

• Improving coverage and adequacy of social benefits while enhancing activation, in line with the Active Inclusion principles (e.g. in Estonia, Italy, France, Croatia, Denmark, Malta, Slovakia and Lithuania).
• Ensuring the social inclusion of those who cannot work (e.g. Greece and Romania).
• Provision of social housing, with a view to improve the housing outcomes of disadvantaged people and promote labour mobility (e.g. Czech Republic, Spain, Romania, Netherlands, and Ireland).
• Upgrading the provision of affordable, accessible and quality childcare (e.g. Czech Republic, Hungary, Lithuania, United Kingdom, and Romania).
• Improving the protection of low-income pensioners through introducing or raising minimum pensions (e.g. Czech Republic and Slovakia) and/or targeted additional benefits (e.g. Czech Republic, Estonia, and Sweden).
• Promoting inclusive education with the primary objective of closing the educational gap of disadvantaged learners, including low skilled adults, learners with special educational needs, migrants and Roma (e.g. Czech Republic, Greece, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, and Belgium).

Find the full report here 

Tags: Europe