Has the Great Recession Changed the Deprivation Profile of Low Income Groups? Evidence from Spain

Abstract

This paper analyses how the economic crisis has modified the relationship between income and mate¬rial deprivation in Spain, one of the European countries most affected by the crisis. We show that the degree of overlap between low income and material deprivation has increased by around 50% from 2008 to 2012, even despite the offsetting effect of the reduction in the (relative) income poverty threshold. We demonstrate that the Great Recession has produced a significant recomposition of the poverty profile in Spain. Our findings underline the increasing role played by long-term unemployment and by differences in tenure status of households in predicting this overlap, four years after the bursting of the property bubble.