The share of the population in poverty, before social transfers (pensions, child allowances, unemployment benefits and aid for vulnerable persons), in Romania, was 23.4% in 2024, below the European Union average of 24.6%, according to data included in the Social Monitor, a project of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Romania Foundation.
According to the analysis, published on Monday, from this point of view, Romania ranks 19th out of the 27 member states, with the highest poverty rates before social transfers being recorded in Bulgaria (30%), Estonia (29.5%) and Lithuania (29%). At the opposite pole are the Czech Republic (16%), Hungary (18.7%) and the Netherlands (20.5%).
At the same time, the monetary poverty rate, after social transfers (excluding pensions), is 19%, which places Romania in 8th place in the European Union. The highest poverty rates after social transfers are recorded in Bulgaria (21.7%), Latvia (21.6%) and Lithuania (21.5%), and the lowest in the Czech Republic (9.5%), Belgium (11.4%) and Denmark (11.6%).
The analyzed data show that Romania records one of the lowest poverty reductions in percentage points, after social transfers (4.4 pp), alongside Hungary (4.4 pp) and Greece (3.9 pp).
In contrast, the countries with the greatest impact of social transfers on poverty reduction are Ireland (13.1 pp), Belgium (12.9 pp) and Denmark (11.8 pp).
"Therefore, the impact of social transfers on poverty reduction is extremely low, despite the fact that Romania records high poverty rates. Partial data for 2025 do not show a substantial change. Moreover, in 2023, the last year with available data, the amount of social protection expenditure in Romania was 12.8% of GDP (of which 8.3% of GDP represents pensions), ranking 4th in the European Union after Ireland (8.1%), Malta (9.7%) and Hungary (10.7%). The highest social protection expenditure as a percentage of GDP is allocated to Finland (25.6%), France (23.3%), Austria (21.2%) and Italy (21%)," the research states.
Social protection expenditures include: pensions paid from the public system, unemployment benefits, child and family allowances, disability benefits, housing support, programs to combat social exclusion (including social assistance benefits), and social protection administrative costs.
"Therefore, the idea that the Romanian state spends too much on social protection is rather a myth, the share of social protection expenditures being reduced compared to needs (high share of the poor population and high share of the elderly population) and in comparison with the other member states of the European Union", note the representatives of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Romania Foundation.
Social transfers are state measures that redistribute resources to the population, in the form of money or services (such as pensions, child allowances, unemployment benefits and assistance for vulnerable people), without any direct return from the beneficiaries. They aim to reduce inequalities and the risk of poverty, contributing to increasing household disposable income.
Overall, in 2024, the share of the population in poverty before social transfers in Romania stood at 23.4%, below the European Union average, which was 24.6%.
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