The map is eloquent: the Alicante coastal regions far exceed the average rate of risk of poverty and social exclusion in the Valencian Community. These are data updated to June 7, 2023 by the Valencian Institute of Statistics that also indicate that this rate is always higher among women. The report also includes that the gender wage gap, although it has decreased from the 19.4% it reached in 2012, in 2020 it rose one point, up to 12%, which is two percent higher than the Spanish average.
The poverty risk indicator, which includes data differentiated by gender, ranges from 21.3% for women in Els Ports, -the lowest rate in the Community, almost 5 points below the Spanish average (26% )- and 43% for the women of the Marina Baixa, more than double, and 5 points above the men of the same region.
Behind Els Ports, the counties with fewer people at risk of poverty and social exclusion are l’Alt Maestrat and l’Horta, and all those in Valencia and Castellón are below 30%, with Valencia being the one with the highest rate among the women (29.2%) and La Safor among men (29.6%).
However, only two Alicante counties, Comtat and l’Alt Vinalopó, maintain this rate below 30%, although they are higher than the national and Valencian average. In addition to the aforementioned Marina Baixa, the Marina Alta (39.6% in men and 41.2% in women) and Vega Baja (41.2% and 42.5%) have more than four out of ten people in a situation risky. The region of the provincial capital, L’AlacantÃ, is the next worst situation, with 37.2% of its women and 34.8% of its men at risk of poverty.
To better understand these data, it is convenient to specify what we are talking about, what it means to be at risk of poverty according to this index, called AROPE (At Risk of Poverty and/or Exclusion). We are talking about people who live in a home with incomes below the established poverty line, that is, 60% of the median equivalent national income in consumption units.
They are households in severe material deprivation, which translates into living without being able to afford at least four of the nine basic consumption concepts established by the European Union: Going on vacation for at least one week a year; a meat or fish meal at least every other day; ability to face unforeseen expenses (from 650 euros); keep the house at a correct temperature; have a car; pay on time the expenses related to the main home (mortgage or rent, electricity, water…) or purchases in installments; have a telephone; have a television and have a washing machine.
The indicator also considers the fact of living in a household with low work intensity, which is calculated by relating the number of months worked by all the members of the household, as well as the number of months that these members could work at most. If the level is less than 0.28, this person is inside the indicator.
If we look at the average income level, again we find the women of Vega Baja in the lower level, with 12,123 euros per year, compared to 12,725 for men from the same region. On the opposite side of the table, L’Horta Nord reached an average income of 19,357 euros per consumption unit and Valencia 18,735. And once again, the five coastal regions of Alicante are the only ones in the Valencian Community that do not reach an average income of 15,000 euros.
According to IVIE data, currently, of the 5 million Valencians, 1.7 million cannot afford one week of vacation a year, 1.6 million cannot afford extraordinary expenses, 775,000 cannot afford an adequate temperature in their homes and more than half a million have been late this year on their home principal payments.
