Socio-economic status

The results of international studies on socio-economic status of the Roma in the EU show that their life is fundamentally worse than the life of non-Roma citizens in all fields.

In 2011, European Commission called upon the Member States to outline national strategies of integrating the Roma people and listed the following data: 10–20 million Romanies live in Europe facing discrimination, exclusion and violation of their rights. They live in much worse socio-economic conditions than other European citizens. The data of six EU countries showed that only 42% of Roma children finish elementary school, while the European average is 97.5%. Only around 10% of Roma children go to secondary school. In the labour market, the Roma people are faced with lower employability and higher discrimination. Their living conditions are poor, since they often do not have access to basic public services, such as running water and electricity. A large gap appears also at their health status: life expectancy of the Roma people is ten years lower than the EU average, i.e. 76 years for men and 82 years for women.

In 2012, the socio-economic status of the Roma people in comparison to the majority of non-Roma citizens in 11 European countries was represented by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Right (FRA). The study published in the publication The situation of Roma in 11 EU Member States encompassed education, employment, health care, accommodation, poverty, discrimination, and awareness. The implementation of the study was made difficult because of the already mentioned problem – data accessibility. Final results show that life of the Roma people is harder in all fields of research in comparison to the non-Roma citizens. The FRA website offers national official and unofficial quantitative as well as qualitative data and other available information on the Roma status in education, accommodation, employment, health care, poverty, awareness, and active citizenship. The data were part of the European Commission report for the European Parliament on the Roma integration development.

 

 

References: 

  • European Commission, 2011, European Commission calls on Member States to set national strategies for Roma integration [online],available at:http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-11-400_sl.htm
  • European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) [and] United Nations Programme for Development (UNDP), 2012, The situation of Roma in 11 EU Member States : survey results at a glance [online],  available at: http://fra.europa.eu/sites/default/files/fra_uploads/2099-FRA-2012-Roma-at-a-glance_EN.pdf

 

 

Living conditions

The right and the possibility to live in acceptable conditions is one of the fundamental human rights. 

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