The cost of living in the Madrid’s community is 15.7% more expensive than the Spanish average, while doing it in Estremadura it is 13.6% less than the average in Spain.
This is indicated by a study carried out by the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), la Pompeu Fabra University (UPF), the Barcelona’s town hall and the Barcelona Institute of Regional and Metropolitan Studies (IERMB), which has revealed that the large metropolises and cities in Spain considered richer are not so rich when the real cost of living is taken into account.
The work, made public this Sunday, points out the need for public administrations to take into account the cost of living in each of the territories when designing social policies to be more realistic and fair, because cities considered rich, such as Barcelona The Madrid, they start to have less real disposable family income than is considered with the current indicators.
The work, titled “The cost of living in the Autonomous Communities, Urban Areas and Cities of Spain”, determines, for the first time, the differences in the cost of living and risk of poverty between autonomies, Metropolitan areas and Spanish cities taking into account the price of living, in each of these territories.
The analysis has been made from price level of each territory and the indicators of household income and the rental price of housing in each community and in metropolitan areas.
“What was already known intuitively, has now been evidenced, showing how territories of the state considered richer, are not so, if this methodology is applied,” the researchers explained.
The work highlights that between Madrid Y Estremadura, the economies that have a higher and lower cost of living, “there is a very big difference”, of almost 30 percentage points, that is, to buy the same basket of products in Madrid 15.7% more money is needed, and in Extremadura there is 13.6% less money than the Spanish average.
Catalua it ranks second and, therefore, the same purchase for its population is 7.6% more expensive than the average for the rest of the State.
When analyzing the cost of living in cities and metropolitan areas, the study also reveals that in cities, such as Toledo, the cost of living is much more expensive than in its metropolitan area and much more even than in the Autonomous Community.
“It is a pattern that is repeated in practically all capitals, such as Barcelona, where the price level is also more expensive than in the whole of the Cataluña. For this reason, if we want to equalize the purchasing power of families in one city and another, we should compensate the population with a higher cost of living with a higher income “, point out the authors.
The study, which introduces as a new variable the rental price of the house Specifically, in addition to disposable family income per capita, it makes it possible to compare the purchasing power capacity by metropolitan areas and cities in Spain.
According to researchers from the IERMB, the official statistics of Europe and Spain do not take into account the different territorial price levels when calculating such relevant indicators as disposable family income or the risk of poverty and therefore they propose estimating price indicators by autonomous regions, Metropolitan areas and large cities, highlighting the relevance of considering these differentials.
By applying these variables, the difference between the autonomous communities with higher and lower income is reduced and, depending on the job, “the level of well-being of the population is captured in a more realistic way, at the local level”.
For this reason, the researchers consider that public administrations should take into account the price level of each of the territories, specifically, when designing social policies “to be more realistic and fair”.
Applying the cost of living modifies the “ranking” of the communities in terms of per capita disposable family income, so that, for example, Cataluña it goes from being the third with the most wealth to the sixth, if the community’s price level is taken into account, going from 13,338 euros of disposable family income to 12,398, and Madrid from the fourth to the tenth, from 13,279 euros to 12,398.
Navarra it would go from second disposable family income community to first place, from 13,585 euros to 13,877, unseating the Basque Country, which would go to second place -from 14,722 euros to 13,749-.
With this new calculation Canary Islands, which would go from 8,963 euros to 9,276- it would be the poorest autonomy instead of Estremadura -which goes from 8,503 to 9,837- and would gain two positions in this ranking, above AndalucÃa which will go from being the 14th poorest to being the 16th -from 9,258 euros to 9,702-.
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