Croatia, Hungary and Bulgaria are the three European Union member states with the lowest recorded level of Actual Individual Consumption (AIC), an indidator measuring the welfare of households, according to a report released by the EU statistics bureau Eurostat.

Across the 28 EU member countries in 2017, the AIC per capita expressed in Purchasing Power Standards (PPS) varied from 54 percent of EU average in Bulgaria to 132 percent in Luxembourg, Eurostat said.

AIC in an economic indicator which measures all goods and services actually consumed by households, and includes both consumer goods and services purchased directly by households and services provided by non-profit institutions and the government for individual consumption, like health and education services.

In terms of AIC per capita, Croatia was classified among five EU countries with AIC 30 percent below the EU average. The other four countries in that group were Latvia, Romania, Hungary (which recorded AIC 30-40 percent below EU average), while Bulgaria had AIC per capita more than 40 percent below EU average.

Ten EU countries had an AIC per capita above EU average in 2017. The highest level was recorded in Luxembourg, at 32 percent above the average, ahead of Germany, with 22 percent.

They were followed by Austria, Denmark, and the United Kingdom, who all recorded levels around 15-20 percent above the EU average. Belgium, Finland, the Netherlands, Sweden, and France had levels around 10 percent above the average.

In Italy, Ireland, and Cyprus, the levels were less than 10 percent below the EU average, while Spain, Lithuania, the Czech Republic, and Portugal all placed 10-20 percent below the bloc’s average.

These were followed by Malta, Slovenia, Greece, Poland, Slovakia, and Estonia at 20-30 percent below the average.

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