Social assistance

Description of statistics

The annual statistics on social assistance contains information on households receiving primary social assistance and preventive social assistance, and on recipients of rehabilitative work benefits paid as social assistance (since 2001).

The statistics provide the following data annually: age structure among recipients, type of household, socio-economic status, duration of recipiency, amount of assistance in euros and the number of recipients each moth during the calendar year. In addition, information is gathered on those who have participated in the rehabilitative work programme. Cross-sectional data for November include sources of income and economic activity among recipients in November.

The regional classifications used are the whole country, regions, regional state administrative agencies and municipalities. Specific classifications exist for socio-economic status, sources of income and economic activities in November and rehabilitative work participants.

The Register of Social Assistance and the annual statistics on social assistance have been maintained since 1985, but the statistics also contain time series data from 1969 onwards concerning the number of clients receiving the type of public assistance paid before social assistance.

The data for the register and the annual statistics are submitted by municipal social care departments electronically or on statistical forms. Data are updated annually, and the annual statistics are completed in November–December.