Two out of three Romanians can’t afford to pay for a holiday

Two out of three Romanians couldn’t afford to pay for a holiday last year, but their share dropped compared to 2012, according to the National Statistics Institute (INS). Some 67.6% of the population wasn’t able to pay for a one-week holiday last year, down 7.8 percentage points compared to 2012, reports local Agerpres. More than half of Romania’s population (51.4%) couldn’t afford to face an unpredictable situation from their own resources, down 2.5 percentage points over 2012. People who suffered from one or more shortcomings specific to economic deprivation reached a share of 74.5% last year, down 6.1 percentage points compared to 2012. More than a quarter of the total number of economically deprived people face three, four, and even five shortcomings. According to Eurostat, Romania ranks first in Europe for the share of people who are unable to to regularly participate in a leisure activity, with over 56% of the Romanians being in this situation, in 2014. More than one in three Romanians (35.7%) said they could not afford to get together with friends/family for a drink/meal at least once a month, in 2014. Romania has the highest relative poverty rate in the EU More than a third of Romania’s population, at risk of poverty Almost one in four Romanian employees are low-wage earners editor@romania-insider.com