Pensioners’ living conditions

Istat publishes this Focus on Pensioners’ Living Conditions to disseminate information about pension beneficiaries, integrating three different statistical sources: the administrative archive ‘Pensioners Central Register’; the Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (Eu-Silc) and the Labour Force Survey.

In 2017 pensioners were 16 million (around -23 thousand compared with 2016; Figure 1), receiving an annual average income of 17,886 euros (+306 euros over the previous year).

Women represented 52.5% of pensioners and received an average pension income 6 thousand lower than men’s pension. Gender gap in pensions’ annual average amount remained extremely marked, but it was decreasing (for old age pension men’s advantage decreased from 72.6% in 2005 to 60.0% in 2017).

As regards geographical areas, in the North-East pensions’ annual average amount exceeded by 19.0% the amount registered in the South and in the Island (8.8% in 1983).

Over two thirds (67.4%) of survivor pension beneficiaries received more than one pension and they were mainly women (86.5%). Old age pensioners less frequently received more than one pension (28.2%).

In 2017 working pensioners numbered 411 thousand (-20.3% from 2011) and three quarters were men. More in detail, 85.0% of employed pensioners were self-employed, 67.2% lived in the northern regions and 52.8% obtained at most a lower secondary school certificate.