Professor Barra Roantree gave evidence on the subject of the CFI-ESRI report on poverty published earlier this year.
The report was co-authored by Roantree, director of the joint ESRI-TCD MSc in Economic Policy.
Key findings of the report included:
- After a decade of uninterrupted growth, inflation has left average disposable income lower than it was two years earlier across the population as a whole. Post-tax and transfer incomes adjusted (equivalised) for household size have fallen in real terms at both the mean and median: by 2.2% and 5.4% respectively between 2021 and 2022, leaving average household disposable income lower than it was in 2020.
- Those aged 65+ are a notable exception to this decline in average disposable incomes. While average post-tax and transfer incomes fell in real terms by around 3% for those aged under 65, they grew by 3% for those aged 65+. Adjusted for both household size and housing costs, average disposable incomes are now higher for those aged above than below 65.