Prices of everything in Croatia increased by 43 percent over two decades from 2001 to 2021, Vecernji List calculated on Thursday, adding that utility bills have went up by 85 percent over the same period.

In January, inflation reached 5.6 percent year-on-year in the European Union and 5.1 percent in the euro zone. In Croatia, inflation also picked up earlier this year to 5.5 percent in January, up from December’s 5.2 percent.

The highest inflation rates in the EU were registered in the Baltic countries while the majority of countries in central and eastern Europe had inflation rates of above 6 percent and close to 9 percent.

“The prices of gas and energy will probably not settle down for some time yet and the majority of citizens will be faced with lower living standards,” Vecernji said.

Inflation has hit pensioners, single parents, and low-income households the hardest, according to a survey by the Zagreb Institute of Economics (EIZ) conducted this week.

The EIZ put the increase in prices in a historical context, calculating that from 2001 to 2021 prices in Croatia overall have jumped 43 percent nominally. Food prices increased by 47 percent, alcoholic beverages became 134 percent more expensive, and people’s individual spending on health care doubled in price. Meanwhile, utility bills jumped by 85 percent during the same period, while telecommunication costs fell by 5 percent, and prices of clothing by 10 percent .

The survey showed that inflation did not affect all groups equally. Over the past two decades, the inflation rate for an average pensioner was 9.3 percentage points higher than the reference rate and around 10.4 percentage points higher for single households, while the inflation rate for 10 percent of the wealthiest Croatians was slightly lower than 2 percentage points lower than the average.

“A pensioner’s household whose monthly spending was 4,000 kuna (€532) in 2001 had to pay 6,107 kuna (€812) in 2021 for the same basket of products, even though the reference inflation rate suggests that their basket should have increased to 5,735 kuna (€763),” Vecernji List quoted EIZ report as saying.

(€1 = 7.52 kuna)