Ljubljana - The share of Slovenian households having no problems making ends meet rose from 18% in 2019 to 21% in 2020. The share of those having a hard time living through the month on their wages remained unchanged at 20%, whereas 31% of the households had "minor problems", Statistics Office (SURS) data show.

The rate of serious material deprivation meanwhile rose by 0.4 of a percentage point to 3%, meaning around 61,000 persons lived in materially-deprived households, up 8,000 over 2019.

Housing expenses, which also include rent or mortgage, were much of a burden for 26% of the households, a drop of 6 percentage points, whereas 15% had no problems.

Nine percent of the households had to delay the payment of these housing expenses or other loans at least once in the 12-month period before the SURS survey, down 2 points over 2019 and 11 points over 2014, the year with the largest share of such households.

People were on average slightly less happy with their lives, as the self-assessment of happiness dropped from 7.5 to 7.4 points on a 0-10 scale, where 0 stands for totally unhappy and 10 very happy.

At least 92% of people aged at least 16 met their friends or relatives for a coffee or lunch at least once a month, a 1-point drop.

The share of those who could not afford to socialise for financial reasons meanwhile remained the same as in 2019, at 3%.

Fifty-four percent of people aged at least 16 could afford to regularly attend payable leisure activities, 1 point down, while the share of those who could not afford it dropped by 1 point to 11%.

SURS said the 2020 data are not fully compatible with the 2019 data because the epidemic had interrupted the surveying, which thus had to be carried out in two rounds.