About

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About this dashboard

  • Title: Households in Austria
  • Number: 2/2020
  • Date: March 25, 2020
  • Author: HFCS Team, Oesterreichische Nationalbank (OeNB)
  • Data: HFCS Austria 2017


What we do

  • This dashboard is the third in our series of Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS) dashboards.
  • Each dashboard is designed to provide concise information on a specific topic.
  • All information displayed - be it figures, tables or text - is based on HFCS data.


Who we are

  • We are the HFCS Team of the Oesterreichische Nationalbank (OeNB).
  • As such, we are tasked with collecting and analyzing data on Austrian households’ finances and consumption.
  • For more information on the HFCS in Austria, visit our website for the HFCS Austria.
  • For general information on the Eurosystem’s HFCS, visit the website of the ECB’s Household Finance and Consumption Network (HFCN).


How to contact us

Find out more by clicking on the Question tab!

Question

Question

Column


Question

How do Austrians live?


Why this topic now?

  • To fight the transmission of the coronavirus (COVID-19), many people have to spend much more time at home than they are used to.
  • If someone in a household is infected/has tested positive for coronavirus, transmission to other household members is likely. It is therefore important to have information on household size and structure - especially in terms of age.
  • To understand what social distancing means for different people, it is important to know how they live. Some may be lonely, while others may not have enough space.
  • By making visible the socioeconomic differences among people, we can better identify the different needs different people have.
  • This dashboard might inspire you to think about the household structure of other people and might help you better understand the situation they are in.


Main Definitions

  • Household: All persons living together in one dwelling and sharing resources.
  • Household member: One of these persons. People living in institutionalized households, such as in homes for the elderly or monasteries, are not included in our analysis.
  • Dependent children: All persons aged 0-15 and persons aged 16-24 who are economically inactive and living with at least one parent.
  • Main residence: Dwelling the household lives in, regardless of whether it is officially registered as a main residence or not.
  • Income: Net household income including all forms of income, such as labor income, capital income or transfers.


Main background facts for Austria

  • The typical household in Austria is not composed of two adults and two children, but rather of a single person.
  • Despite a wide variety of household structures, more than 70% of households are one-person or two-person households.
  • The elderly live mostly in such one or two person households.
  • Multigenerational households including both elderly people and children are scarce in Austria. Elderly persons rarely live in the same household with children.
  • In cities, households tend to be smaller.
  • The living space available to individuals within their homes varies largely and decreases with household size.
  • Renters have much less living space than owners.

For detailed information on the methodology, please refer to the methodological notes and the results for Austria.

Find out more by cklicking on the Answer tab!

Answer

Column

1 person household

2 person household

3 person household

Answer

How many people live together in a household?

Source: HFCS Austria 2017, OeNB.

We first take a look at the size of households: How many members do households have?

The chart shows 100 rectangles. Every rectangle represents 1% of Austrian households and therefore approximately 39,000 households of the approximately 3.9 million households in Austria.

Almost 40% of Austrian households consist of only one person, and less than 30% consist of more than two persons.

Less than 6% of Austrian households consist of five or more persons.

Where do the children live?

Source: HFCS Austria 2017, OeNB.

To answer this question, we used a rather broad definition of children: We included all persons aged 0-15 and persons aged 16-24 who are economically inactive and living with at least one parent.

Again, the chart shows 100 rectangles. Every rectangle represents 1% of Austrian households and therefore approximately 39,000 households of the approximately 3.9 million households in Austria.

Altogether, less than one-quarter of households has children.

About 14% of the households with children (3.4% of all households) are single-parent households.

Of the households with children, most consist of the parents (both living in the household) and one or two children.

The share of households in which three or more adults live together with dependent children is rather small, corresponding to a mere 3.6%.

More than three out of four households do not have any children, and almost half of these households are single households consisting of only one person (living alone).

Where do these households live and how old are they?