Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

File photo. Shutterstock/Cilinskas

Ireland's poorest households saw their income dip even further during the pandemic

Research from the Economic and Social Research Institute found that the decline was due to a drop in the number of hours worked.

IRELAND’S POOREST HOUSEHOLDS saw their income fall even further during the Covid-19 pandemic due to a decline in the number of hours worked, new research from the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) has shown. 

This is despite a strong labour market recovery which saw 200,000 more people employed in 2021 than in 2020 following the easing of Covid restrictions. 

The full report, published by the ESRI using data from the Survey of Income and Living Conditions collected by the Central Statistics Office, will be launched by Equality Minister Roderic O’Gorman on Thursday. 

It found that real household income fell for the poorest tenth of people between 2020 and 2021. While income growth stalled for most other low earners, incomes grew for moderate and higher earners.  

  • Our colleagues at Noteworthy want to investigate if the State is doing its best to stop children going to bed hungry. Support this project here.

“This pattern of growth meant that measures of income inequality – which declined to their lowest recorded level in 2020 – increased in the latest year of data available, the first such increase since 2017,” the report states.

It states that the fall in earnings for lower-income households was driven by a drop in hours worked per week and months of full-time work per year. 

“This suggests that the impact of the labour market recovery in 2021 was more muted for those in lower- than higher-income households, despite Revenue (2023) statistics showing that individual earnings growth has been strongest at the bottom of the individual earnings distribution in recent years,” the report states. 

The research also examined the material deprivation rate – the share of individuals unable to afford two or more items from a list of ten essentials. 

These include two pairs of strong shoes; a warm waterproof overcoat; new (not secondhand) clothes; a meal with meat, chicken, fish (or vegetarian equivalent) every second day and home heating during the last year. 

It found that the material deprivation rate rose from 13.3% in 2021 to 16.6% last year. 

The report found that the material deprivation rate for a single adult with children was 42% in 2022, compared to 15.9% for two adults with children. 

The slow income growth documented in the study occurred before the sharp rise in prices following the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. 

Barra Roantree, assistant professor of economics at Trinity College Dublin and lead author of the report said policymakers should be concerned by its findings. 

“Ongoing high rates of inflation are likely to further erode incomes, raising the prospect of three years without real income growth for most households,” he said.

“Policymakers will face difficult decisions in Budget 2024 about which groups to prioritise given our reliance on potentially transitory receipts from corporation tax, with untargeted tax cuts or increases in spending risking stoking further inflation.”

Readers like you are keeping these stories free for everyone...
A mix of advertising and supporting contributions helps keep paywalls away from valuable information like this article. Over 5,000 readers like you have already stepped up and support us with a monthly payment or a once-off donation.

Close
53 Comments
This is YOUR comments community. Stay civil, stay constructive, stay on topic. Please familiarise yourself with our comments policy here before taking part.
Leave a Comment
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute anthony murphy
    Favourite anthony murphy
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:11 AM

    I don’t know how people are surviving. I work full time in a decent paying job and I’m barely making it. Country is destroyed for many.

    743
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Shaun Gallagher
    Favourite Shaun Gallagher
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:36 AM

    @anthony murphy: Yep, I know what ya mean

    212
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Alan Farrell
    Favourite Alan Farrell
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:59 AM

    @anthony murphy: Yup, same. I’m on decent money and my savings are just going lower and lower every month. And it seems our government have been in hiding for months now, not a peep out of them. We’re basically at the mercy of private companies now, hoping that energy companies, supermarkets, petrol stations etc find it in their hearts to lower their prices back to reasonable levels.

    382
    See 2 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute another one? what's going on is the semi state sec
    Favourite another one? what's going on is the semi state sec
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 8:08 AM

    @anthony murphy: Blame the gangsters that are the Irish government. Mismanaging taxpayer funds, bouncing from crisis to crisis, unable to provide proper services under their remit. Tax is set up so that the taxman benefits more % wise from any pay increase were lucky to get than our net pay does. Our buying power is being eroded all the time. Services aren’t up to scratch for what we’re paying. And because the current tax rates are the norm now, with USC, when things go wrong they’ll hit us up for more. 33.6 billion they took off us last year via income tax alone. Compare that to 2007 which was 13.6 billion. Then there’s the bumper Vat take….etc as well. Coining it in while we’re all struggling. Wasting it too

    202
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Llennoc
    Favourite Llennoc
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 10:15 AM

    @anthony murphy: Money making mules are all we are. Pay income tax, usc, then healthcare if lucky to be able to afford it. Most expensive
    Energy prices in Europe
    Buy groceries and pay VAT, pay carbon taxes on fuel, pay expensive insurance, bin charges, LPT and if you have anything left for a pint you will be fleeced there too.

    96
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Magnificent Mongoose
    Favourite Magnificent Mongoose
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:17 AM

    Shame on the successive governments that allowed it to get to this.

    401
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Oisin CK
    Favourite Oisin CK
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:49 PM

    @Magnificent Mongoose: shame on Governments for putting in place one of the most comprehensive welfare systems in Europe, plus a successful economy that has resulted in full employment. There is absolutely no reason now for anyone not to work.

    10
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Dan Danny
    Favourite Dan Danny
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:16 AM

    Worrying trend, I.T jobs getting outsourced to India first and now l know a few hotel employees getting hours reduced from 40 to 28hrs in a like it or lump it deal because it can be sourced cheaper or contract workers used

    314
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Fiona Wyse
    Favourite Fiona Wyse
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:48 AM

    @Dan Danny: we are on a race to the bottom. Lots on financial companies outsourcing as well.

    274
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute john dennehy
    Favourite john dennehy
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:57 AM

    @Dan Danny: The DAA only guarantees 30 hours a week for security staff and they are a semi-state company.

    176
    See 3 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Tom Newell
    Favourite Tom Newell
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:56 AM

    @Dan Danny: Sadly the over reliance on the FDI’s thinking our low corporate tax rate would keep them here is not as good as what they believe. That being said I also know in my previous company they are doing the reverse and reducing the amount of outsourcing of call centers to the likes of India because customers are requesting a european or irish based team as well, so it can happen both ways

    49
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Brian Hoey
    Favourite Brian Hoey
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:48 AM

    @john dennehy: have you seen the state of the toilet facilities in the airport. Seen plenty of staff just standing around chatting. Would say they need extra staff due to the amount of absenteeism and can only promise 30 hours due to the extra staff if they are all available to work.

    26
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Oisin CK
    Favourite Oisin CK
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:50 PM

    @Dan Danny: yet employment in the IT sector has continued to rise?

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Favourite Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:52 AM

    The current government’s lust for power is driven by the cabbage head’s party so called green agenda and hence will dip into all lower and middle class pockets. The pandemic may have been a bit problem, but not so green party is the big problem. Roll on election time!!

    300
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Kieran Finn
    Favourite Kieran Finn
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:56 AM

    @Ollie Fitzpatrick: same parties in successive governments for yrs but its the green party fault , do you really believe that it’s all entirely on 1 party

    79
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Favourite Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:07 AM

    @Kieran Finn: My post is self explanatory, the government’s lust for power is driven by the Greens so called green agenda! Be realistic and look deeper into your green heart!

    144
    See 9 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Shaun Gallagher
    Favourite Shaun Gallagher
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:38 AM

    @Kieran Finn: plus FF and FG will be in government for the foreseeable future to as they will keep joining up

    32
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Paddy C
    Favourite Paddy C
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 8:48 AM

    @Ollie Fitzpatrick: the cycle lanes look well all the same breath in the fumes of the cars passing by which lack of alternative transport, discover Ireland

    17
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Chris O'Brien
    Favourite Chris O'Brien
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:31 AM

    @Ollie Fitzpatrick: I hate the Greens. As anyone on here knows.

    But rhe sentence you’ve constructed makes no sense.

    How is a lust driven by an agenda?

    This implies that without Greens agenda, FFFG, the party in power for the last 100+ years, didn’t care about power?

    That’s counterfactual.

    The Greens put FFFG in power – and the country hates them for that and much more on top, but the rest of your idea doesn’t make much sense.

    And btw the Greens agenda is right wing pro-corporate Greenwashing.

    FFFG was up to that for decsdes before the Greens put them back in power.

    21
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Favourite Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:50 AM

    @Chris O’Brien: Simply explained for you Chris:
    Both FF/FG were lusting for power and in order to gain that power coalesced with the Greens, with the promise that whatever the Greens wanted they would get. Hence it was a lust for power as I said initially.
    Comprendez vous?

    34
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Sean O'Dhubhghaill
    Favourite Sean O'Dhubhghaill
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 10:50 AM

    @Ollie Fitzpatrick: Your first sentence makes no sense. How can a lust for power be driven by a green agenda? I don’t understand.

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Philip Duffy
    Favourite Philip Duffy
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 3:41 PM

    @Ollie Fitzpatrick: Roll on election time, for what?

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Favourite Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 5:32 PM

    @Philip Duffy: to get rid of the pocket picking cabbage heads and co!

    5
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Oisin CK
    Favourite Oisin CK
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:52 PM

    @Ollie Fitzpatrick: the current Govt exists because they have a majority of TDs the people elected to the Dail, that’s democracy.

    1
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Favourite Ollie Fitzpatrick
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:54 PM

    @Oisin CK: How can you call it a democracy when you have the Cabbage Head Party who just got 7% of the votes calling the shots. Are you in the real world man?

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Kieran Menon
    Favourite Kieran Menon
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:28 AM

    Used to be able to save up thousands over the months, but now my income just teethers above what’s going out…

    Could afford a car paid in full for 10 grand a few years ago, be lucky trying to do that now. –.–;

    228
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Playmisty4me
    Favourite Playmisty4me
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:35 AM

    Hardly surprising with the spiralling cost of living including over inflated electricity bills by greedy energy companies – I hope you’re reading this Electric Ireland. Then we have the over excited supermarkets who decided this was their opportunity to over inflate the cost of food so they can greedily rake in even more profits. Meanwhile our wonderful politicians sit back tut tutting at the spiralling inflation and give themselves another payrise, while families struggle to put food on the table and old people can’t afford heating.

    258
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Robert Halvey
    Favourite Robert Halvey
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:00 AM

    When a nation kept returning ffh to power for well over a century, what the he’ll did they expect

    190
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Oisin CK
    Favourite Oisin CK
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 8:18 AM

    @Robert Halvey: stable economy and full employment

    31
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute james rowan
    Favourite james rowan
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:04 AM

    @Oisin CK: and no one any money

    87
    See 6 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute M Bowe
    Favourite M Bowe
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:10 AM

    @Oisin CK: A job is a ‘means to an end’ leading a reasonable life still with stable conditions, home happiness, family etc. People like you seem to think that a job in itself is the End aim even when it delivers few if any of those conditions.

    51
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Iano C
    Favourite Iano C
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:26 AM

    @Oisin CK: Precisely. These noisy polito-bots commenting on here have a slim grasp on reality. Which is surprising because a good chunk of them suckle at the government’s teat for free health care, housing, education etc. What a world we live in!

    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Chris O'Brien
    Favourite Chris O'Brien
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:35 AM

    @Oisin CK: you highlight exactly how useless these metrics are. The American south during slavery had very high levels of people working and a booming economy.

    The Nordic countries have higher standards of living and much better everything, without full employment.

    Etc etc.

    And of course, the state of this country now illustrates this perfectly. Every system is broken – 80th worst healthcare system globally – record homelessness – decade long housing crisis, etc.

    Full employment hasn’t solved this.

    In fact we all have to work to not end up homeless under FFFG. Hardly a vote for them staying in power.

    65
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute John Terry
    Favourite John Terry
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:43 AM

    @Iano C: exactly,I find the people who complain the most about services and entitlements are the ones who contribute the least.

    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Donal Desmond
    Favourite Donal Desmond
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 10:42 AM

    @John Terry: You mean like the banks and developers facilated by politicians…Bailed out by the taxpayers…The same taxpayers who were then forced by the same politicians into austerity to repay for the gangsterism of the banks and developers…It’s not government money..It taxpayers money, and are quite entitled to benefit from their investment in the state.

    51
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Seamus Enright
    Favourite Seamus Enright
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 11:16 AM

    @Chris O’Brien: I couldn’t have said it any better. Fine Gael don’t seem to care how difficult things are for working class and middle income families as long as both parents are having to work.

    They don’t care if the work is providing any actual utility or provides any job satisfaction. They don’t care if people have to go on soul-destroying commutes to get to their job and back.

    I feel like there could be a tent city outside Leo Varadkar’s house where all the residents were dependent on food banks and he would still be boasting about our GNP per capita and high employment figures.

    Fianna Fail are only marginally better.

    39
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Tom Newell
    Favourite Tom Newell
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:53 AM

    Yet the usual apologists and me fein brigade will roll in and start telling us everything must be great cos they are getting along financially. My best friend is a single mother and she works full time and barely gets by, things got so bad last winter she had to get a second job to keep her bills topped up and was lucky she had her mom to look after her kid but was literally working every hour she had to keep the lights on and bills paid…

    153
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Paddy C
    Favourite Paddy C
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:55 AM

    Yet there are those within government saying most people made money in the pandemic if people were earning more than the 350 still had they’re rent and mortgages to pay aswel as everything else the only difference was those who have lifestyles weren’t out and about,a lot of people don’t have lifestyles they go week to week so they were worse off and still are now not many got pay rises either I didn’t and plenty I know didn’t either,that’s the reality,years there’s people doing well earning good money but not the majority in the real world

    86
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Dvsespaña
    Favourite Dvsespaña
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 8:47 AM

    Wasn’t this just another crazy anti vaxer conspiracy theory? That lockdown measures were disproportionately and negatively impacting the ordinary working people of Ireland!
    We’re all in this together…

    But of course they said, it was based on following the scientific consensus! Aka, see what other clueless governments are doing based on their own false and baseless assumptions and just blindly copy that, then hold up the fact that every other government is doing the same by way of validation..

    Which incidentally has also proven to be yet another widely condemned conspiracy theory that was actually proven true..

    81
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute
    Favourite
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 10:12 AM

    The Nation of screw the worker,USC was to be abolished after 4 year,it’s still here,it’s a PAYE tax if you ask me & non contribution worker gets a pension at 66 of 244 euro,while the worker gets 254 euro of a pension,the workers pension at the end of his/her working life should be more substancial than a non contributer

    65
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Brendan shanahan
    Favourite Brendan shanahan
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 11:04 AM

    Agreed. PAYE workers keep the show on the road. Usc, temporary tax until they find something to replace it with. Banks exploiting depositors, electricity companies exploiting user’s. Inheritance bands remain the same despite numerous promises from Mr V our visionary leader. Please tax PAYE workers in the same manner as farmers.

    38
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Anon
    Favourite Anon
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 6:29 PM

    Well said, state pension for contributor shoud have a bigger differential

    9
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Mark Breathnach
    Favourite Mark Breathnach
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 9:24 AM

    It’s the public service that’s eating the billions ‘ not fit for purpose and the idiots running the country couldn’t organise a pizz up in a brewery

    61
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Wayne Shoes
    Favourite Wayne Shoes
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 3:08 PM

    I will definitely be voteing sinn fein .Have to get this shower out.They simply Don’t give a s..veradker makes that crystal clear in the interviews he has given

    18
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Monty Carlow
    Favourite Monty Carlow
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 3:34 PM

    Unable to live. Survive yes. Live? No.

    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Nicola
    Favourite Nicola
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 4:09 PM

    As a family carer I can testify to this. paid basic social welfare while getting no support or financial help looking after a disabled child 24/7. And now it’s even worse with surging costs everywhere. Now we hear the government talking about falling corporation tax before the budget so we know not to expect anything more.
    Ireland really pisses on its vulnerable

    16
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute dec
    Favourite dec
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 11:07 AM

    The covid payments provided by the government during the pandemic were some of the most generous in the world, this isn’t a government issue but sure “FFG grrrr how dare they get fairly elected”

    10
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Donal Desmond
    Favourite Donal Desmond
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 12:12 PM

    @dec: It was taxpayers money that was used..FFG suddenly found the money tree they said didn’t exist…As for borrowing..FFG stated it was imprudent..Yet FFG borrowed Billions..on top of the 60 Billions owed to repay for the gangsterism of the banks and developers facilated by the same politicians. The same banks who FFG/ Greens exempted from pay cooperation tax on their profits for the next 20 years. That’s the circus of FFG/ Greens.

    42
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute dec
    Favourite dec
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 1:09 PM

    @Donal Desmond: news flash: government uses tax money to pay for things! And here I was thinking Varadkar was paying for covid payments with money from his shoe

    7
    See 4 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute David Corrigan
    Favourite David Corrigan
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 1:37 PM

    @dec: The financial waste in this country is frightening. FFG are not qualified to run the country. It’s as simple as that.

    22
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute dec
    Favourite dec
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 2:56 PM

    @David Corrigan: then don’t vote for them and if the majority disagree with you like last time, tough.

    2
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Donal Desmond
    Favourite Donal Desmond
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 4:21 PM

    @dec: But Varadkar and Martin would have you think the taxpayers had nothing to do with it…Remember when Varadkar was forced to close a PR company set up by FG to tell us the how good they were….Only problem was it was taxpayers money that was used…of course like the Radio adverts that end…Brought to you by the Government Of Ireland…Well that piece of useless adverts was paid for by the taxpayers.

    8
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Oisin CK
    Favourite Oisin CK
    Report
    Sep 5th 2023, 7:52 PM

    @Donal Desmond: the same banks that paid back in full the bailout they received?

    1
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.

Leave a commentcancel

 
JournalTv
News in 60 seconds