Portugal 2016

ENQUADRAMENTO SOCIOECONÓMICO RENDIMENTO E CONDIÇÕES DE VIDA DAS FAMÍLIAS SOCIO-ECONOMIC FRAMEWORK INCOME AND LIVING CONDITIONS OF HOUSEHOLDS 43 The at-risk-of-poverty rate was higher in Portugal than in the EU28 (19.0% against 17.3% in 2015 respectively). On a first stage, up to 2003 approximately, the difference in at-risk-of-poverty rates was due to both the risk gap before social transfers and the lower impact of social transfers. However, as of 2004 the at-risk-of-poverty gap before transfers vis-à-vis the EU28 was positive for Portugal, with the gap of the impact of transfers playing less favourable a role in Portugal than in the EU28. This gap narrowed and, as a consequence, there was a downward trend of the gap of the at-risk-of-poverty rates after social transfers vis-à-vis the EU28, which in 2011 stood at 1.2 p.p., compared to around 4.0 p.p. in 2002. However, more recently this gap rose further, to stand at 2.3 p.p. and 2.2 p.p. in 2014 and 2015 respectively. The increase in the differential in these two years was associated with a lower impact of social transfers in Portugal, since the differential of the at-risk-of-poverty rate before transfers was almost nil or favourable for Portugal. The at-risk-of-poverty rate continued to show differences according to age (more marked for youth), household composition (penalising single adults and households with dependent children, and among these, larger households and those with one adult only), and activity status (the risk of poverty is much higher than average for the unemployed and much lower for the employed population). In the case of the elderly (those aged 65 and over) there were evident improvements between 2003 and 2012, with the at-risk-of-poverty rate declining from 28.9% to 14.6%, despite the reversal seen in the three subsequent years (it increased to 18.3% in 2015). In addition, women recorded a higher risk once again, countering the one-off reversal observed in 2012. Comparing the at-risk-of-poverty rate after social transfers recorded in 2015 (19.0%) with the previous values, there was a return to the levels of the start of the 2000s, although with some improvements in certain groups. In addition to the elderly, as already mentioned, there were improvements in most households with no dependent children, employed and retired persons. Conversely, there was a worsening in households with dependent children (although with a few exceptions depending on their composition) and in the unemployed group. Overall, the relative median at-risk-of-poverty gap (as defined by the comparison between the median income of persons at risk of poverty and the at-risk-of-poverty threshold) worsened between 2012 and 2014 (28.9% on average for this three-year period, compared to 24.7% between 2003 and 2005). In 2015, however, there was an improvement in the indicator, which declined by 2.3 p.p., to 26.7%.