• Market income per person
• Income inequality
• Population with low incomes
• Population with low living standards
• Housing affordability
• Household crowding

Population with low living standards

Relevance

ELSI is an indicator of how people are living in terms of their possessions and activities and how they get by financially. Having a low living standard limits a person’s ability to participate in the wider society, curtails their quality of life, and can have negative long-term consequences across a wide range of social and economic outcomes.

Current level

In 2000, 4 percent of the total population had "very restricted" living standards, 5 percent had "restricted" living standards and a further 11 percent had "somewhat restricted" living standards. In total, 20 percent of the population had living standards in the bottom three levels of the ELSI scale.

Figure EC4.1 Proportion of the population with lower living standards, 2000

Source: Krishnan et al (2002) p40

Population group differences

Groups with a higher-than-average prevalence of low living standards include sole-parent families (51 percent), families who rely on income-tested benefits (57 percent), families with dependent children (particularly larger families), Māori and Pacific peoples (39 percent and 42 percent, respectively), and those living in rented dwellings. Dependent children are more at risk of low living standards than the population average. The probability of having low living standards declines with age, except for a slight increase during peak child-rearing years.

Table EC4.1 Proportion of population and economic families with low living standards (ELSI Levels 1–3), 2000

Source: Krishnan et al (2002)