The effect of the crisis on material deprivation in Italy and Spain

The focus of this paper is on the analysis of the impact of the crisis on material deprivation in two South European countries: Italy and Spain. The countries chosen have been deeply hit by the economic downturn and the use of the available comparable microdata allows us to detect the most vulnerable collective in the crisis taking into account also gender differences. The microdata used are the Italian and Spanish Income and Living Conditions Surveys of 2007 and 2010. Our results confirm the growth of deprivation as a consequence of the economic crisis in both countries and show that women are more likely to face income poverty and deprivation.