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Discrimination against single-parent households

Question écrite de Mme Evelyn REGNER - Commission européenne

Question de Mme Evelyn REGNER,

Diffusée le 13 juin 2023

Subject: Discrimination against single-parent households

The Commission has set itself the goal of significantly reducing child poverty. According to Eurostat figures, single-parent households are the type of family most affected by poverty and social exclusion. Statistics Austria’s child-cost analysis from 2021 has shown that, in Austria, it costs twice as much to have a child in a single-parent household than in a household with two or more adults. This was calculated using child consumption units, and it revealed that the at-risk-of-poverty threshold for children in single-parent households is much lower than for children belonging to households with two or more adults. Furthermore, an estimated 30 % of single parents that are actually suffering from poverty have no access to financial support.

Given that in many European countries, at national level, the at-risk-of-poverty threshold serves as an income limit for financial aid, the following questions arise for the Commission:

1. Is the Commission aware that the inaccurate reporting of child consumption units makes it impossible to know the real extent of child poverty in single-parent households?

2. Does the Commission agree that adjusting child consumption units would give more families access to financial aid and thus contribute significantly to reducing child poverty and preventing the social exclusion of more children?

3. Does the Commission intend to take action on this matter and set separate European child consumption unit standards for single-parent households and for households with two or more adults?

Submitted:14.6.2023

Réponse - Commission européenne

Diffusée le 31 juillet 2023

Answer given by Mr Schmit on behalf of the European Commission

(1 August 2023)

Indicators have been agreed with Member States to assess developments in tackling child poverty and social exclusion. In particular, the children at risk of poverty or social exclusion (AROPE) rate is among the new headline indicators of the Social scoreboard agreed in 2021 (1).

Furthermore, the EU poverty reduction target of reducing the number of people AROPE by at least 15 million by 2030 also relates to lifting at least 5 million children out of poverty or social exclusion. 19 Member States have set complementary national targets on child poverty and many of them have used the AROPE indicator to do so.

The equivalence scale that is used for EU indicators, such as the AROPE one, gives a weight to all members of the househol d (2). It already allows to estimate the equivalised disposable income by accounting for the various household compositions in terms of consumption units, the related economies of scale, and, by the same token, the different standards of living which households with different compositions enjoy.

On average in the EU in 2022, 43% of single-parent households with children are AROPE against 20% of households composed of two or more adults with children (3).

Reflecting these difficulties, children living in a single-parent household are included in the target group of the European Child Guarantee (ECG) Council Recommendation adopted in 2021 (4), which calls upon Member States to guarantee effective access of children in need to key services.

1 ∙ ⸱ The proposal to revise the Social scoreboard including new headline indicators was first presented in the European Pillar of Social Rights Action Plan and then

endorsed by leaders through the Porto Declaration on 8 May 2021. For further information on the scoreboard see: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/european-pillar- of-social-rights/overview

2 ∙ ⸱ For further information see: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Glossary:Equivalised_income. In order to reflect differences in

household's size and composition, the total (net) household income is divided by the number of ‘equivalent adults’, using a standard (equivalence) scale (the so-called modified OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) equivalence scale): this scale gives a weight to all members of the household (and then adds these up to arrive at the equivalised household size): 1.0 to the first adult; 0.5 to the second and each subsequent person aged 14 and over; 0.3 to each child aged under 14.

3 ∙ ⸱ Figures take into account children below 18. They are based on the latest EU-SILC data release, and extracted from the dataset ILC_PEPS03N, accessible here:

https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/ILC_PEPS03N/default/table?lang=en 4 ∙ ⸱ https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32021H1004








| | ) The Commission supports Member States in the implementation of the ECG, so that children in need, including children living in single-parent households, benefit from the necessary support and have access to key services, contributing to reducing child poverty in Europe.

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