Statistics in Focus: Population and social conditions. More women than men living in workless households.

Abstract

Being in paid employment, or more precisely, having access to earned income, is generally regarded as being essential to avoiding social exclusion and poverty. A corollary of the equal opportunity dimension of the European Employment Strategy is that women should be no more likely than men to live in households where no one is in work. In a number of EU Member States, spouses or partners of someone who becomes unemployed or, in some cases, who becomes economically inactive, may face fiscal barriers to them entering or remaining in the labour market because of the features of the tax and benefit system. In most cases, those affected are women, who may also face social and other obstacles to employment, rather than men. Equally, women are more likely than men to be living on their own with young children and so more vulnerable to exclusion because of caring responsibilities.