The most recent statistical data from the National Institute of Statistics (INE) shows that 15.4% of people in Portugal were at risk of poverty in 2024, 1.2 percentage points less than in 2023, and the poverty risk rate in 2024 corresponded to the “proportion of inhabitants with net annual monetary income per adult equivalent of less than 8,679 euros (723 euros per month)”.
According to the INE, this decrease in poverty was observed in all age groups, but more markedly among the elderly.
The Francisco Manuel dos Santos Foundation, however, warns today, in an update to its study on inequality and poverty in Portugal, that 1.7 million people live below the poverty line, even though the most recent statistics reveal that around 100,000 managed to escape poverty by 2024.
“Portugal continues to be a country where 18.6% of the population is in a situation of poverty or social exclusion, 8.6% of the employed population has incomes that do not allow them to escape poverty, and approximately 300,000 children are poor,” says the study, initiated in 2016 and authored by Carlos Farinha Rodrigues, which analyses the country’s social situation.
According to the study, in the last 30 years, the poverty rate has decreased by 7.6 percentage points (p.p.) and the number of poor people has decreased by about 29%, but “Portugal continues to be one of the European Union countries with a high incidence of poverty.”
On the other hand, it highlights that children and young people were the age group that registered the slightest reduction in the poverty rate, in contrast to the elderly population, in which there was “a sharp reduction in the poverty rate,” which “contributed decisively to the fall in the overall rate.”
Child poverty
The study by the Francisco Manuel dos Santos Foundation points out that there is no detailed information on the profile of child poverty in 2024, but, based on 2023 data, it states that the incidence of poverty is higher among adolescents aged 12 to 17 (19.2%), a group that represents about 40% of children living in poverty.
The research indicates that about 25% of children living in poverty live in single-parent families, mainly single mothers, while more than 20% live in large families. About 75% live in households where the main source of income is work.
“Child poverty is concentrated mainly in large metropolitan areas, with 54% of children living in poverty residing in Greater Lisbon and the Northern region; the poverty rate exceeds 38% among children with parents of foreign nationality,” says the study.
On the other hand, it is in families with children that “a slight increase in the incidence of poverty is recorded, from 16.4% to 16.6%,” particularly among single-parent families, where poverty exceeds 35%.
“Conversely, families without children registered a decrease in the poverty rate of 2.3 percentage points, strongly influenced by the reduction in poverty among single-person households, particularly those consisting of a single elderly person,” says the study.
It highlights that, despite the improvement in indicators of material and social deprivation, “more than 29% of respondents remain unable to ensure the immediate payment of an unexpected expense” and emphasizes that if there were no social transfers, the poverty rate would be higher than 40%.