Publicaciones

At first glance, it appears Spain entered the COVID-19 crisis in a relatively good position. The household leverage rate had fallen below the eurozone average, reducing the amount of income Spanish households earmarked for debt service payments from 11.7% of their disposable income in 2008 to 6.1% at the end of 2019. Yet, 33.9% of Spanish households would be unable to deal with an unexpected expense of only 700 euros, which is higher than the EU-27 average. When analysed based on metrics such as age, gender, household composition, and geography, it becomes clear that there are certain groups particularly vulnerable to the economic effects of COVID-19. For example, among those with a lower secondary education, 47.8% of individuals would be unable to deal with an unexpected expense. Similarly, 53.7% of households headed by a single adult and 46% of households composed of a single woman would struggle. Notably, those aged between 16 and 24 present the highest percentage of an inability to deal with an unexpected expense, while 31.7% of this group are ‘at risk of poverty or social exclusion’, 6.4 percentage points above the overall average. For these reasons, targeted government measures that rely on intergenerational generosity would be required to successfully exit this crisis.

Maudos, J. (2020). «Resilience of Spanish households to the economic fallout from COVID-19». SEFO – Spanish Economic and Financial Outlook 9, n.º 5 (septiembre): 49-57.