/ world today news/ On average, per person from a household of four, the cost of living is BGN 558.82 as of September, and a Bulgarian family of two adults and two children needs BGN 2,235 for a normal life.
This is indicated by the data of the Institute for Social and Trade Union Research of the National Security Council.
This money is used to cover the costs of food, housing, health care, education, transportation and recreation. According to statistics, 78.5 percent of households in the country live with a total income per person below the necessary means of subsistence.
30.5 percent of households have a total income per person below the subsistence level for poor households (up to BGN 297), or that makes nearly 2 million 200 thousand people.
The number of people living below the absolute poverty line is decreasing by about 57,000 people, but the pace is slow, so their share remains at high levels, KNSB also points out, referring also to data from the National Statistical Institute for the second quarter of 2016. Households with a total income per person from BGN 297 to BGN 559 are 48 percent or about 3 million 462 thousand people.
Households with a total income per person above the cost of living (BGN 559) are 21.5 percent or about 1.6 million people.
KNSB notes that the high share of households that are forced to self-limit their expenses, since their incomes fall short of the necessary means of subsistence, remains high.
Low wages remain a problem, and those who have started work find it very difficult or almost impossible to get out of the “poverty trap”, analyzed by KNSB.
The ISSI of the Central Bank of Ukraine indicate that these conclusions are also confirmed by the latest data from Eurostat’s SILC study for 2015, according to which 41.3 percent of the population in our country is exposed to the “risk of poverty and social exclusion”, with an average level of 23.7 percent for the EU-28.
Bulgaria is the EU member state reporting the highest share of people at risk of poverty or social exclusion, followed by Romania (37.3 percent) and Greece (35.7 percent).
Even with a decreasing share of persons at risk of poverty or social exclusion compared to 2008 (44.8 percent for 2008), Bulgaria maintains its leadership position in the EU in terms of this indicator, the experts analyze.
Bulgaria is also at the top in terms of the share of people living in severe material deprivation (34.2 percent), followed by Romania (22.7 percent) and Greece (22.2 percent).
According to KNSB, the data give reason to claim that there are no significant changes in the economic well-being of the population. The number of people living in poverty is decreasing, but Bulgarian society has not become richer, given the fact that the share of people living at risk of poverty and social exclusion remains at high levels, the KNSB found.
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