Is the Well-Being of Children Converging in the European Union?

Recent discussion of convergence in the European Union has focused on macroeconomic indicators, in line with requirements for participation in the single currency. But it is reduction of disparities in living standards that is an ultimate goal of European integration--the greater "economic and social cohesion" emphasised by the Treaty on Union. We assemble evidence on whether the well-being of children in Member States has been converging over the last two decades, taking a variety of indicators: poverty, household worklessness, youth unemployment, child mortality, youth suicide, educational enrollment, teenage fertility, and self-reported "life satisfaction".