EN - [REPORT] Spain has one of the highest child poverty rates in the EU due to the high vulnerability of households with children, low spending on family policies and the limited effectiveness of current benefits. This report carries out several simulations of both targeted and universal transfer policies throughout the country using EUROMOD, a tool that considers the interaction between all transfer policies and personal income tax. The results indicate that universal benefits combined with targeted benefits are the most effective strategy to reduce child poverty and propose making the minimum allowance for descendants refundable, strengthening and redesigning the CAPI and, if the budget allows, creating a universal benefit that could reduce the incidence of child poverty by up to 21% and its intensity by 45%. This expenditure would involve an additional 0.75% to 1% of GDP, but this investment would clearly be acceptable given the high medium- and long-term economic cost of persistent child poverty in Spain. 

EN - [OPINION ARTICLE] The article published in elDiario.es, based on recent report authored at FEDEA, highlights a growing divide in Spain in both wealth and opportunity. Over the past two decades, household wealth has risen sharply, but this growth has mainly benefited older and higher-income groups, widening both generational and patrimonial inequalities. Housing remains the key driver of this imbalance: while property owners have seen their assets appreciate, younger generations face increasing barriers to entry, accumulating far less wealth than their predecessors at the same age. The piece concludes with a call for a new intergenerational pact focused on expanding affordable housing, fostering long-term saving, and rebalancing fiscal policies to ensure a fairer distribution of opportunities.

EN - [REPORT CHAPTERS]  The IX FOESSA Report warns of an unprecedented process of social fragmentation in Spain in which the middle class is shrinking. Five key problems are identified that reinforce each other: chronic precariousness, a very uneven impact of the crisis between generations, an unsustainable housing crisis, a breakdown in community ties and the need for a change of model. Specifically, our contributions can be found in chapters 2.5 and 2.8, which focus on economic growth and income distribution in the 21st century and on wealth distribution and social stratification. They analyse how economic crises have accentuated precariousness and wage polarisation and how recent changes, such as the collapse of the property market and tensions in access to basic assets, have increased the gaps between the most privileged sectors and the most vulnerable households.

EN - [WORKING PAPER] This report analyses the evolution of household wealth in Spain between 2002 and 2022, using microdata from the Spanish Survey of Household Finances (EFF) conducted by the Bank of Spain. The study examines the aggregate dynamics of net wealth, its composition in real and financial assets, the distribution of wealth across percentiles, and its evolution by age and birth cohort. The results show a significant increase in average wealth over the period, interrupted by the 2008 and 2020 crises, along with a growing concentration of wealth among households at the top of the distribution. The analysis also reveals an increasingly pronounced generational divide. Cohorts born between 1956 and 1975 have consolidated high levels of wealth in a more favourable economic context, whereas millennials exhibit weaker wealth trajectories, lower access to homeownership, and less asset accumulation. This divergence poses significant challenges for intergenerational equity and the design of public policies in the areas of housing, saving, and wealth redistribution.

EN - [BLOG POST] In Spain, economic well-being inequalities are among the highest in the European Union, and this lack of social cohesion negatively affects quality of life. Well-being is determined not only by income and wealth, but also by how people perceive risks and uncertainties about the future. Economic insecurity—understood as the concern about future economic problems and the inability to cope with them due to a lack of resources—emerges as a threat to social cohesion, affecting health, life decisions, and financial expectations. As our colleagues explain in this article, these findings highlight the pressing need to address insecurity as a broader social challenge.

EN - [WORKING PAPER] This paper presents the first systematic analysis of regional wealth inequality in Spain. We do so by combining administrative fiscal data with household surveys and national accounts between 2016 and 2022. We document substantial regional disparities in both average household wealth and its concentration. Madrid stands out as the region with the highest average wealth and top 1% wealth share. Our findings are relevant in the Spanish institutional context, where autonomous communities exercise considerable control over wealth taxation and public expenditure.

ES - [DOCUMENTO DE TRABAJO] Este documento presenta el primer análisis sistemático de la desigualdad regional de la riqueza en España. Para ello, combinamos datos fiscales administrativos con encuestas a hogares y cuentas nacionales entre 2016 y 2022. Documentamos disparidades regionales sustanciales tanto en la riqueza media de los hogares como en su concentración. Madrid destaca como la región con la riqueza media más alta y la mayor cuota de riqueza del 1% más rico. Nuestras conclusiones son relevantes en el contexto institucional español, donde las Comunidades Autónomas ejercen un control considerable sobre la fiscalidad del patrimonio y el gasto público.

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SPAIN WEALTH ATLAS