THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION REPORT. Europe in a period of transition

SOCIAL EUROPE IN ACTION: A NEW IMPORTANCE IN THE PANDEMIC AFTER A LOST DECADE 73 Figure 2 ). By contrast, following the increase from 2009 to 2011, the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) ex- perienced a long period of high-level stagnation due to the euro crisis. Between 2008 and 2019, the cumulative number of people lifted out of risk was only just under two million. A significant reduction is noticeable since 2016. The EU was able to return to its pre-crisis level; in the euro area, this was not possible until 2018. A comparison made with the reduction in the risk of poverty and social exclusion reveals a distribution similar to that already seen for income per capita: in terms of their risk rates, the southern and eastern European cou- ntries are above the EU average; the Scandinavian coun- tries along with Germany and France are below average. While the changes over time in the group of countries scoring below average (i.e. countries with relatively low risk rates) are on a small scale (although Germany at least achieved a reduction of 3.2 percentage points bet- ween 2014 and 2019), developments in the other four countries are more remarkable: Romania is catching up at a fast pace; since joining the EU in 2007, its risk rate has fallen by almost 16 points from a starting point of 47 percent to 31.2 percent, which translates into some three million people being lifted out of the risk of poverty. In Spain and Italy, on the other hand, there was a significant increase in the risk of poverty and social exclu- sion from 2009/10 (see Table 4), which could only be re- duced again at a later stage. Italy returned to its pre-crisis level for the first time in 2019, with Spain failing to follow suit; cumulatively, almost one million additional people here have been impacted by risk since 2008. In relative terms, just over five percentage points separate both of these southern European countries from Romania. Esto- nia, which always fared better than Italy and Spain in the Time/Geopolitical entity (reporting). Time frequency: Annual Sex: Total Age class: Total Unit of measure: Percentage Euro area -19 countries (from 2015) European Union (EU6-1958, EU9-1973, EU10-1981, E… Values People at risk of poverty or social exclusion Geopolitical entity (reporting) 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 20.5 21 21.5 22 22.5 23 23.5 24 24.5 25 Source: Eurostat. Figure 2. Risk of poverty and social exclusion as a percentage in the EU and euro area, 2008-2019