Trends in Consumption-Based Poverty and Inequality in the European Union During the 1980s

Most recent studies on poverty and inequality in developed countries focus on income. In contrast, this paper presents trends in consumption-based poverty and inequality in nine member countries of the European Union. During the 1980s, both poverty and inequality increased in Italy, France, the United Kingdom, Germany and Belgium, while decreases in both poverty and inequality are observed for Spain and Portugal. In Greece only inequality increased. For most countries for which income-based results are available, these move in the same direction as the consumption-based results. However, this sensitivity analysis yields considerable differences in the ranking of countries and the magnitude of the changes.