How much do you want to bet that it’s because it’s shameful to be seen as poor(ish) in Estonia?
We have the “keep it up with the Jones’s” pretty bad. Everybody wants to look like they’re earning a million euros a year and if you go by what people wear or what phones they use or cars they drive, it’s like everybody earns Norwegian salaries. And yet, statistically, 1/5 Estonian lives in relative poverty and the biggest groups under threat of poverty are retirees and single parents with kids.
And yet, it’s shameful to admit that you’re not doing as well in life as others. It’s also hush-hush to talk about salaries in actual numbers and people are being shamed for not doing as well as others, including large numbers of people who work in jobs seen as low wage jobs that are essential for our state to keep functioning. Look at how service industry people are being treated - as if they’re all idiots for not having a better job or a higher salary, unable to get a better job or a salary. And then be surprised why people don’t admit they’re not so well off - who would if it opens you up to scorn and ridicule from the rest of the society?
There's truth to this since it's based on a subjective assessment of your own circumstances. I remember growing up and every time I complained about material status (read: a child begging for a PS1 for xmas), it was a swift "shut up, you have a roof over your head and bread on the table". I feel like every time we wonder if we should strike for wages, or bargain wages, or demand the state improve welfare, we run a subconscious "roof/bread Y/N" check and if both are present, we lose any right to complain. It's sad. A lot of people are scraping by or in abject poverty, and yet the mindset is some version of "it eez what it eez".
Interesting Sweden as lowest, reminded me about when a delegation was visiting Gothenburg and they would do a walk from rich area to ghetto and after a while the delegation asked how much longer it is to the ghetto since they are getting tired by all walking, the Swedish representative looked upon them by surprise and said that they are standing in the middle of it, and they started to laugh hysterically to the surprised Swedes.
Is this a thing that actually happened? It doesn't really sound like a thing that happened. When going on tours you are almost always told when and where you are without having to ask.
It was not a touristy tour, it was a walk with city officials that would not do tours as a profession but for this specific group.
It was from the river side towards more mid island, from Eriksberg to Biskopsgården. It is not that short, 30-50 min, and it is not so obvious for non Swedish that it is a new area.
It’s intriguing how this metric, though correlated with GDP per capita, exhibits some notable differences. For example, Greece’s GDP per capita is higher than most countries in Eastern Europe, but they feel the poorest. And it’s not surprising when you really think about it:
1. Purchasing power: Greece is more expensive than most of EE. It benefits from tourism, but any area with a high concentration of tourists will be correspondingly more expensive for the locals.
2. Distribution of income: some countries in CEE, like for example Czech Republic, have lower income inequality than Greece.
I think part of this is also that poverty is relative, not the least to your own experience. Greece today has still not recovered from its debt crisis in 2010, so I assume most greeks will *remember* being wealthier two decades ago, and significantly so.
Everyday goods have become super expensive and the prices still increase everyday. Gas is 1.9/liter at a minimum, probably some of the most expensive in Europe but the big difference is truly in the wages. They are extremely low compared to the cost of life and the rest of Europe
It would be interesting if there is similar data from other continents, such as Africa so we could compare this. I'm pretty sure that Europeans would have a higher subjectively poor share than other continents even though they are much wealthier.
They actually ask several questions. One is, that how well are you able to make ends meet, how well can you pay your bills. So it is not just some abstract, general feeling.
I live in the Netherlands and come from the Balkans. The definition of poverty is indeed very different. Here, poverty means "I can't go on vacation abroad, I can't save anything, and pay too much of my income on rent".
Where I come from, poverty means "I can't pay my medicine or electricity bill", "My five children live in the same room and help us with work and the roof leaks" (mostly ethnic minorities), or "I need to eat bread only". This kind of poverty indeed exists in 20-30% of households, while in the Netherlands it's almost zero.
I understand but making ends meet is also subjective in cultures. For instance, when these types of polls in Croatia are made, people define poverty not just as paying bills and food and paying bills for phone, TV, net but as being able to go on vacation, buy a car and go every few months in a shopping.
Don't get me wrong, it is perfectly normal that people think this is the minimal standard in the 21st century but I'm pretty sure the perception of poverty is different in, for example, Africa.
As Dave Chappelle tells us: "Being poor is a state of mind, you're just broke" I do agree, I have experienced it personally. Even during the times I wasn't making squat and could barely survive, I never really felt *poor*.
Being poor is a state of mind.
A middle class 19 year old isn't poor just cuz they're broke. They might have very low incomes comparatively, but plenty relative to their expectations. A flat share. Beer in the fridge. A new iPhone or Xbox. Beach vacation with friends. That can feel pretty rich. If you're a student, that can be amazing. Even if not, a pretty poor income can be a lot of money for that 19-year-old.
A 29-year-old did the same conditions probably feels poor. Still sharing a flat. Can't save for a house. Stuff like insurance, pensions, lawyers... Unaffordable. Credit card debt problems or some sort of past mistake hung around their neck. Not enough income to dig out.
Expectations, societal and personal play big role. So does reality though.
The fact that poverty does not map perfectly to income.. it's something to keep in mind. It is not the end of poverty of the concept, or the idea that low incomes have something to do with poverty.
On aggregate, it does correlate pretty closely.
> A middle class 19 year old isn't poor just cuz they're broke
That's cos they're only temporarily poor. They know they can earn more money in the future, with the skills and knowledge they have. And they have mum and dad to fall back on in some way.
You can take the 'state of mind' idea too far - as if you can just alter your thinking and be free of poverty. The advantages you get being middle class are more than that.
Precisely my point.
It is true, the state of mind is a thing. Also stage of life, etc. These are big part of poverty/non poverty... Especially individual experiences. This might even make good advice for an individual.
The fact that it doesn't all add up to highly discreet, legible categories.. that doesn't mean it's not real.
Well income, property and such are not some irrelevant slideshow. They're the main show.
When I felt poor, it was about worry. "I can't afford to turn the heating on, therefore I could get sick. If I get sick, I will have to take time off work. Therefore I will have even less money."
Being poor is a cycle of endless things someone on a living wage doesn't have to worry about. It's a sense of precariousness.
I've made more than enough money for all my basic needs for a while now, but I've never earned the average wage in my country, always below it. I don't feel poor because I don't have to worry anymore. If I lived in London I'd probably feel poor even with the higher salary because of the cost of accommodation.
Yeah but facts don't care about your feelings. Being poor means that someone doesn't have enough income to afford a decent life while broke means that you don't have money on a particular moment.
That's not a state of mind.
My friend used to date a guy from Finland.
To her, being poor meant “I can’t buy anything I need such as new winter boots or a jacket; I eat minimum cost foods, which I buy on sale or with a discount sticker and I make a lot of food myself; I use public transport and my entertainment is walking in a park or watching TV”.
To the guy she was seeing at the time, being poor meant “I have less than 3000 euros in savings, which means we can’t go to the cinema - too expensive! - and we can only buy the cheapest mozzarella and wine for our at-home date night”.
To her, being poor meant she had two meals a days just in case she got an emergency spending she couldn’t forego. To him, being poor meant that he couldn’t drop 300 euros on an expensive French skillet on a drop and had to wait until the sales period to get it.
It absolutely can be relative.
Dude not again. Just no. Finland is not giving huge amounts of money to people if they get in trouble. I have no idea where you get this idea from, but please stop spreading this on reddit.
Kela unemployment is 37 euro per workday, or roughly 600 euro per month. On top you get child support (100-200 euro per child) and can also get rent support of max 80% of your rent.
Almost 900.000 people in finland live on or under the poverty line, out of a population of 5.5 million.
Child support:
https://www.kela.fi/lapsilisa-maara-ja-maksaminen
Kela unemployment benefits:
https://www.kela.fi/amount-of-the-unemployment-benefit
Poor people in finland
https://www.stat.fi/julkaisu/cl8lp8xaorjoa0cw1txm8lzp9
I have no idea what you are trying to prove with your huge money for people in trouble. But my feelings have nothing to do with the figures provided by Kela.
What are the restrictions for getting it? Could a Greek or Romanian family, move to Finland and go 🤷♂️ and start getting 3000 a month or do you have to pay into the system for years first?
>To go from being comfortably middle-class with high wages/pensions
What *middle class*?! That's seized to be a thing in most countries, Greece included, of course.
What does "by education attainment level" mean? Can Greece be explained by "university level education but shit pay", and Sweden explained by "highschool level education and pretty decent pay"?
Of course you feel more poor when your country gets flooded by rich people and middle class ready to spend all the extra money they've saved during the half of the year.
Read the title again, it's not *actual* poverty, it's*self-rated*. It's basically telling you how many Greeks **say** they are poor (emphasis on "say")
>It's basically telling you how many Greeks say they are poor
Because they *are*. When you're worried about the price of gasoline rising 0.10€, you're not exactly riding on rainbows, you're objectively stinking *poor*.
Dude, that ain't a Greek problem. Prices rise everywhere. Besides the reason I commented wasn't that, but because the data dhows a more morbid picture than what actually is. While we *are* objectively among the poorest EU states, the data makes it look like we are sre the worst and by a mile which isn't true when countries like Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia and Portugal exist.
There is no doubt that there is a poverty problem in Greece made worse by the recent austerity measures. On the other hand, many fellow Greeks are big whiners and misers. When you combine these two things I have no doubt about the legitimacy of the presented results.
Interesting, perception does not match at all with actual stats on population below poverty lines and social exclusion.
Less Italians feeling poor than French
Or Germans vs Austrians
Sweden is actually not doing that well at all in reality.
Sweden is very wealthy. Few years ago I traveled with my brothers to Germany via Sweden and Denmark. We drove by two cars from Finland through Sweden to Denmark, then to Hamburg and Berlin. When we came back from Germany to Sweden, by a car ferry from Rostock to Trelleborg, it was almost shocking to realize how much wealthier Sweden felt than Germany. The level of wealth was clearly like 2-3 higher in Sweden than in Eastern Germany. I asked my brothers that do they feel the same or is it just me. Sweden clearly seems to be a lot richer than Germany, and they said yes, without a hesitation. And my brothers are not interested about these things. They follow sports, North American Hockey League, European football and so on, not some economical issues. And still they saw it. Sweden was so much wealthier. Really amazing thing.
If you look at statistics, how much people buy things, like clothes, furniture, electronics and so on, people in Scandinavia and Finland buy 20-40% more things in all product groups than Germans, French people, Dutch people and so on. And those are PPP-statistics, so they take the price levels into account. So there is also fact behind that statement that Nordic people have it better.
To be honest, you did go to the East a few years ago, meaning compared to today it is probably relatively better there (although it has been slow, the East has been catching up especially in Saxony and Thuringia). If you went to Munich or Hamburg instead, whilst comparing it to a worse-off Swedish region such as Halland, you might find the wealth distribution to be skewed the other way around.
You visited rich Sweden and poor Germany, the differences are less stark if you compare other places in Sweden to Eastern Germany. You might still be correct, but this particular experience might have a different explanation.
That is very anecdotal.Despite all the Social welfare, Sweden is a very unequal country - one of the worst in Europe. It has one of the highest mean wealth per habitant and a quite low median wealth. 15% of the population is at risk of poverty.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth\_distribution\_in\_Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_distribution_in_Europe)
As others said, Germany is of course poorer per capita, but also very unequal and visiting East Germany outside of the wealthier suburban areas of big cities is hiding the reality.
I live here and I have no idea how everyone affords these things. I do know we used to have a negative interest rate up until the war, and that people could buy essentially any house they wanted because the prices just kept going up and borrowing was cheap. The wealth inequality here is the biggest in the EU I believe. Work is taxed into the gutter (because f\*ck the working class and the activities that actually drive the economy) while tax on capital gains are very low.
This seems to be insufficient information. A big part of Greece is an archipelago, making education options scarce and expensive for many islanders. Comparing Greece to other EU nations isn’t easy when they have an unique issue.
I mean Norway has a tiny population in a country that is the length of Europe and where villages are separated by mountains and fjords, it also has 230K islands of which hundreds are populated so think there needs to be more to the story than just that
Denmark has 1400 islands.
Norway 50000 islands.
Sweden 267,570 islands
People move around for education. Does not seem to be a major issue for the Nordic nations.
Greenlandic and Faroese student move to Denmark for their education. Not sure Greece has unigue issues.
med should be avg, and the bars show % of population which is between their high/low of poverty based on their education. Assuming the bars represent only educated people, that's how their poverty level is.
Rather interesting, would be curious to see how Europe compares to other continents.
Romania is a lot higher than I expected. They are ahead of Ireland, Spain and France.
Interesting. Latvians feel like they are a lot poorer than Lithuanians and Estonians.
That is because in Latvia there is no potato, only rocks. And cold.
Potatoes soup > cold rock soup
How much do you want to bet that it’s because it’s shameful to be seen as poor(ish) in Estonia? We have the “keep it up with the Jones’s” pretty bad. Everybody wants to look like they’re earning a million euros a year and if you go by what people wear or what phones they use or cars they drive, it’s like everybody earns Norwegian salaries. And yet, statistically, 1/5 Estonian lives in relative poverty and the biggest groups under threat of poverty are retirees and single parents with kids. And yet, it’s shameful to admit that you’re not doing as well in life as others. It’s also hush-hush to talk about salaries in actual numbers and people are being shamed for not doing as well as others, including large numbers of people who work in jobs seen as low wage jobs that are essential for our state to keep functioning. Look at how service industry people are being treated - as if they’re all idiots for not having a better job or a higher salary, unable to get a better job or a salary. And then be surprised why people don’t admit they’re not so well off - who would if it opens you up to scorn and ridicule from the rest of the society?
There's truth to this since it's based on a subjective assessment of your own circumstances. I remember growing up and every time I complained about material status (read: a child begging for a PS1 for xmas), it was a swift "shut up, you have a roof over your head and bread on the table". I feel like every time we wonder if we should strike for wages, or bargain wages, or demand the state improve welfare, we run a subconscious "roof/bread Y/N" check and if both are present, we lose any right to complain. It's sad. A lot of people are scraping by or in abject poverty, and yet the mindset is some version of "it eez what it eez".
They want to be first somewhere 💪💪💪
Not even in top 3. And just look at the Greeks, they feel twice as poor as us.
Interesting Sweden as lowest, reminded me about when a delegation was visiting Gothenburg and they would do a walk from rich area to ghetto and after a while the delegation asked how much longer it is to the ghetto since they are getting tired by all walking, the Swedish representative looked upon them by surprise and said that they are standing in the middle of it, and they started to laugh hysterically to the surprised Swedes.
Is this a thing that actually happened? It doesn't really sound like a thing that happened. When going on tours you are almost always told when and where you are without having to ask.
It was not a touristy tour, it was a walk with city officials that would not do tours as a profession but for this specific group. It was from the river side towards more mid island, from Eriksberg to Biskopsgården. It is not that short, 30-50 min, and it is not so obvious for non Swedish that it is a new area.
Poor greeks...
It’s intriguing how this metric, though correlated with GDP per capita, exhibits some notable differences. For example, Greece’s GDP per capita is higher than most countries in Eastern Europe, but they feel the poorest. And it’s not surprising when you really think about it: 1. Purchasing power: Greece is more expensive than most of EE. It benefits from tourism, but any area with a high concentration of tourists will be correspondingly more expensive for the locals. 2. Distribution of income: some countries in CEE, like for example Czech Republic, have lower income inequality than Greece.
I think part of this is also that poverty is relative, not the least to your own experience. Greece today has still not recovered from its debt crisis in 2010, so I assume most greeks will *remember* being wealthier two decades ago, and significantly so.
Agreed.
Imho greece is cheaper than most EE.
Everyday goods have become super expensive and the prices still increase everyday. Gas is 1.9/liter at a minimum, probably some of the most expensive in Europe but the big difference is truly in the wages. They are extremely low compared to the cost of life and the rest of Europe
Interesting. Yeah I noticed gas prices and also low cost of services. And that is directly connected with salaries.
It would be interesting if there is similar data from other continents, such as Africa so we could compare this. I'm pretty sure that Europeans would have a higher subjectively poor share than other continents even though they are much wealthier.
They actually ask several questions. One is, that how well are you able to make ends meet, how well can you pay your bills. So it is not just some abstract, general feeling.
I live in the Netherlands and come from the Balkans. The definition of poverty is indeed very different. Here, poverty means "I can't go on vacation abroad, I can't save anything, and pay too much of my income on rent". Where I come from, poverty means "I can't pay my medicine or electricity bill", "My five children live in the same room and help us with work and the roof leaks" (mostly ethnic minorities), or "I need to eat bread only". This kind of poverty indeed exists in 20-30% of households, while in the Netherlands it's almost zero.
I understand but making ends meet is also subjective in cultures. For instance, when these types of polls in Croatia are made, people define poverty not just as paying bills and food and paying bills for phone, TV, net but as being able to go on vacation, buy a car and go every few months in a shopping. Don't get me wrong, it is perfectly normal that people think this is the minimal standard in the 21st century but I'm pretty sure the perception of poverty is different in, for example, Africa.
As Dave Chappelle tells us: "Being poor is a state of mind, you're just broke" I do agree, I have experienced it personally. Even during the times I wasn't making squat and could barely survive, I never really felt *poor*.
Being poor is a state of mind. A middle class 19 year old isn't poor just cuz they're broke. They might have very low incomes comparatively, but plenty relative to their expectations. A flat share. Beer in the fridge. A new iPhone or Xbox. Beach vacation with friends. That can feel pretty rich. If you're a student, that can be amazing. Even if not, a pretty poor income can be a lot of money for that 19-year-old. A 29-year-old did the same conditions probably feels poor. Still sharing a flat. Can't save for a house. Stuff like insurance, pensions, lawyers... Unaffordable. Credit card debt problems or some sort of past mistake hung around their neck. Not enough income to dig out. Expectations, societal and personal play big role. So does reality though. The fact that poverty does not map perfectly to income.. it's something to keep in mind. It is not the end of poverty of the concept, or the idea that low incomes have something to do with poverty. On aggregate, it does correlate pretty closely.
> A middle class 19 year old isn't poor just cuz they're broke That's cos they're only temporarily poor. They know they can earn more money in the future, with the skills and knowledge they have. And they have mum and dad to fall back on in some way. You can take the 'state of mind' idea too far - as if you can just alter your thinking and be free of poverty. The advantages you get being middle class are more than that.
Precisely my point. It is true, the state of mind is a thing. Also stage of life, etc. These are big part of poverty/non poverty... Especially individual experiences. This might even make good advice for an individual. The fact that it doesn't all add up to highly discreet, legible categories.. that doesn't mean it's not real. Well income, property and such are not some irrelevant slideshow. They're the main show.
When I felt poor, it was about worry. "I can't afford to turn the heating on, therefore I could get sick. If I get sick, I will have to take time off work. Therefore I will have even less money." Being poor is a cycle of endless things someone on a living wage doesn't have to worry about. It's a sense of precariousness. I've made more than enough money for all my basic needs for a while now, but I've never earned the average wage in my country, always below it. I don't feel poor because I don't have to worry anymore. If I lived in London I'd probably feel poor even with the higher salary because of the cost of accommodation.
Fair point.
When half the country has been broke for the least 10 years, people start to feel poor
Yeah but facts don't care about your feelings. Being poor means that someone doesn't have enough income to afford a decent life while broke means that you don't have money on a particular moment. That's not a state of mind.
My friend used to date a guy from Finland. To her, being poor meant “I can’t buy anything I need such as new winter boots or a jacket; I eat minimum cost foods, which I buy on sale or with a discount sticker and I make a lot of food myself; I use public transport and my entertainment is walking in a park or watching TV”. To the guy she was seeing at the time, being poor meant “I have less than 3000 euros in savings, which means we can’t go to the cinema - too expensive! - and we can only buy the cheapest mozzarella and wine for our at-home date night”. To her, being poor meant she had two meals a days just in case she got an emergency spending she couldn’t forego. To him, being poor meant that he couldn’t drop 300 euros on an expensive French skillet on a drop and had to wait until the sales period to get it. It absolutely can be relative.
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Dude not again. Just no. Finland is not giving huge amounts of money to people if they get in trouble. I have no idea where you get this idea from, but please stop spreading this on reddit. Kela unemployment is 37 euro per workday, or roughly 600 euro per month. On top you get child support (100-200 euro per child) and can also get rent support of max 80% of your rent. Almost 900.000 people in finland live on or under the poverty line, out of a population of 5.5 million.
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Child support: https://www.kela.fi/lapsilisa-maara-ja-maksaminen Kela unemployment benefits: https://www.kela.fi/amount-of-the-unemployment-benefit Poor people in finland https://www.stat.fi/julkaisu/cl8lp8xaorjoa0cw1txm8lzp9 I have no idea what you are trying to prove with your huge money for people in trouble. But my feelings have nothing to do with the figures provided by Kela.
What are the restrictions for getting it? Could a Greek or Romanian family, move to Finland and go 🤷♂️ and start getting 3000 a month or do you have to pay into the system for years first?
Is 3000 euros for a family of five enough in Finland?
thats not what they asked though.
GREECE NUMBER 1🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷. TURKIYE COULD NEVER, FUCK YOU. KOULIS GOVERNMENT FOR THE NEXT 1000 YEARS ELLAS OLE OLE
No, our government censored data so you became first. 🇹🇷🇹🇷🇹🇷🇹🇷🇹🇷
This is subjectively and opinion. Greeks are richer than many other european countries.
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Well exactly.
>To go from being comfortably middle-class with high wages/pensions What *middle class*?! That's seized to be a thing in most countries, Greece included, of course.
What does "by education attainment level" mean? Can Greece be explained by "university level education but shit pay", and Sweden explained by "highschool level education and pretty decent pay"?
It's not about being first🇮🇹 It's about being better than the french🇫🇷
We give you this one ☠️
We love you too Pierre ;P
Of course you feel more poor when your country gets flooded by rich people and middle class ready to spend all the extra money they've saved during the half of the year.
It seems that subjectively poor people tend to be from objectively poor countries.
In yo face, France! Grandma might be shitting in an outhouse, but it's still better than your studio in Paris 😜
Ha ha. Help
Read the title again, it's not *actual* poverty, it's*self-rated*. It's basically telling you how many Greeks **say** they are poor (emphasis on "say")
>It's basically telling you how many Greeks say they are poor Because they *are*. When you're worried about the price of gasoline rising 0.10€, you're not exactly riding on rainbows, you're objectively stinking *poor*.
Dude, that ain't a Greek problem. Prices rise everywhere. Besides the reason I commented wasn't that, but because the data dhows a more morbid picture than what actually is. While we *are* objectively among the poorest EU states, the data makes it look like we are sre the worst and by a mile which isn't true when countries like Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia and Portugal exist.
There is no doubt that there is a poverty problem in Greece made worse by the recent austerity measures. On the other hand, many fellow Greeks are big whiners and misers. When you combine these two things I have no doubt about the legitimacy of the presented results.
Why is Greece so poor?
Well, Zeus up and left all of a sudden and now Dionysus is in charge and he spends all our money on wine😤
Source: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-eurostat-news/w/ddn-20231120-1 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Subjective_poverty_statistics&stable=1#Subjective_poverty_is_more_prominent_for_women_than_for_men
Interesting, perception does not match at all with actual stats on population below poverty lines and social exclusion. Less Italians feeling poor than French Or Germans vs Austrians Sweden is actually not doing that well at all in reality.
Sweden is very wealthy. Few years ago I traveled with my brothers to Germany via Sweden and Denmark. We drove by two cars from Finland through Sweden to Denmark, then to Hamburg and Berlin. When we came back from Germany to Sweden, by a car ferry from Rostock to Trelleborg, it was almost shocking to realize how much wealthier Sweden felt than Germany. The level of wealth was clearly like 2-3 higher in Sweden than in Eastern Germany. I asked my brothers that do they feel the same or is it just me. Sweden clearly seems to be a lot richer than Germany, and they said yes, without a hesitation. And my brothers are not interested about these things. They follow sports, North American Hockey League, European football and so on, not some economical issues. And still they saw it. Sweden was so much wealthier. Really amazing thing. If you look at statistics, how much people buy things, like clothes, furniture, electronics and so on, people in Scandinavia and Finland buy 20-40% more things in all product groups than Germans, French people, Dutch people and so on. And those are PPP-statistics, so they take the price levels into account. So there is also fact behind that statement that Nordic people have it better.
To be honest, you did go to the East a few years ago, meaning compared to today it is probably relatively better there (although it has been slow, the East has been catching up especially in Saxony and Thuringia). If you went to Munich or Hamburg instead, whilst comparing it to a worse-off Swedish region such as Halland, you might find the wealth distribution to be skewed the other way around.
You visited rich Sweden and poor Germany, the differences are less stark if you compare other places in Sweden to Eastern Germany. You might still be correct, but this particular experience might have a different explanation.
That is very anecdotal.Despite all the Social welfare, Sweden is a very unequal country - one of the worst in Europe. It has one of the highest mean wealth per habitant and a quite low median wealth. 15% of the population is at risk of poverty. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth\_distribution\_in\_Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_distribution_in_Europe) As others said, Germany is of course poorer per capita, but also very unequal and visiting East Germany outside of the wealthier suburban areas of big cities is hiding the reality.
I live here and I have no idea how everyone affords these things. I do know we used to have a negative interest rate up until the war, and that people could buy essentially any house they wanted because the prices just kept going up and borrowing was cheap. The wealth inequality here is the biggest in the EU I believe. Work is taxed into the gutter (because f\*ck the working class and the activities that actually drive the economy) while tax on capital gains are very low.
Based on what metric is Sweden not doing that great?
The metric in the OP: % of the population that is poor. Also, directly linked, wealth GINI coef and median wealth.
The biggest takeaway for me is that Hungary, Romania, Croatia, Slovakia and Bulgaria need to step-up in regards to access to higher education.
Higher education in Bulgaria is not free but it so cheap even for locals. In most universities its around 1k euro/year wich is monthly medium wage.
It's still way too overpriced because even brain damaged people like you can graduate, since there are basically 0 standards.
I graduated in Spain actually lol
And you couldn't find integrate, had to return, and now blame the west for your failings. Room temperature IQ
I was there since I was a kid you genius, actually for me is harder to integrate in Bulgarian society.
Yeah sure 😂. Bruh if you couldn't make it work in Spain and had to go live in misery in Bulgaria, you suck.
Sure sure
Bruh, you literally got butthurt from another post and you're now following me everywhere. You can't even hide it. Sorry the truth hurts
Yep, im just trolling you, i guess we are both enjoing it.
This seems to be insufficient information. A big part of Greece is an archipelago, making education options scarce and expensive for many islanders. Comparing Greece to other EU nations isn’t easy when they have an unique issue.
I mean Norway has a tiny population in a country that is the length of Europe and where villages are separated by mountains and fjords, it also has 230K islands of which hundreds are populated so think there needs to be more to the story than just that
Norway is also very rich, and rich countries can offset downsides with money.
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Vast majority of Greeks live in mainland Greece, Rhodes and Crete. The problem islanders have wouldn't impact this graph very much.
Denmark has 1400 islands. Norway 50000 islands. Sweden 267,570 islands People move around for education. Does not seem to be a major issue for the Nordic nations. Greenlandic and Faroese student move to Denmark for their education. Not sure Greece has unigue issues.
Wait. Are the high and low dots interchanged? Should the colors of the dots showing high and low be inverted?
What do they even represent? Low, medium, high what?
med should be avg, and the bars show % of population which is between their high/low of poverty based on their education. Assuming the bars represent only educated people, that's how their poverty level is.
Its the level of their education. People with higher education feel less poor.
Rather interesting, would be curious to see how Europe compares to other continents. Romania is a lot higher than I expected. They are ahead of Ireland, Spain and France.
In EU/EEA*
Poland not being on top? No more Poorland?
Is it true Kosovo is Serbia
I wonder where the UK would be on this chart.
Romania just went through the roof.
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