Assessing Household Living Standards and Income Resilience at the Outset of the Cost-of-Living Crisis

Abstract

This paper explores the living standards of Ireland’s 1.9 million households at the outset of the 2021/23 cost-of-living crisis and considers the heterogeneous experience of that crisis by households across income distribution. The widespread nature of price increases, and their particular impact on areas of large recurring household expenditure (e.g. food, fuel and energy), has resulted in a cost-of-living crisis impacting all households, although some faced into the crisis with a better ability to absorb, or manage, these higher living costs. Using data from the Survey on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) the paper considers the living standards of households at the outset of the crisis, and based on this assesses their capacity to absorb increases in nominal living costs. Using data on the subjective assessment of household’s ability to make ends meet, it classifies households into those who were already struggling, those who were unlikely to be able to absorb a marked increase in nominal living costs, and those with sufficient means to manage these cost increases despite their scale. The paper poses three research questions: What were living standards like prior to the crisis? What ability had households to absorb large nominal increases in living costs? Which households were most impacted by the crisis? Households are examined across the income distribution and within other socio-economic classifications such as household composition and tenure. The analysis therefore aims to provide a more comprehensive picture of the resilience, or otherwise, of Irish households as they faced into the cost-of-living crisis.