Purchasing Power Parities:

Swedish households’ Actual Individual Consumption 9 percent above EU average

Statistical news from Statistics Sweden 2018-12-17 9.30

Swedish households’ Actual Individual Consumption (AIC) per capita is 9 percent above average for the 28 EU countries in 2017. Sweden ranks twelfth in Europe.

Actual Individual Consumption (AIC) consists of goods and services that are consumed by the individual irrespective of whether these goods and services are purchased and paid for by households, by the government or by non-profit organisations. In international comparisons AIC is often seen as the preferable indicator for households’ actual standard of living.

The dispersion in AIC per capita between the 28 EU countries and Norway, Iceland and Switzerland, ranges from 32 percent above to 46 percent below the EU 28 average. Luxemburg tops the list with 32 percent above, followed by Norway which is 27 percent above and Switzerland which is 24 percent above the average. However, it should be noted that Norway, Switzerland and Iceland is not included in the EU 28 average.

Purchasing power parities 2015-2017 — Actual Individual Consumption in purchasing power standards (PPS), 2017 (EU28=100)

Note: Sorted firstly by value and secondly alphabetically.

GDP per capita is mainly an indicator of the economic activity in a particular country.

Sweden’s GDP per capita is 21 percent above the EU 28 average in 2017. Luxembourg has by far the highest GDP per capita, at 153 percent above the EU average. The relatively high figure is partly due to a large number of foreign residents working in the country and thus contributing to the GDP, while not being included in the population statistics. Bulgaria has the lowest figure in this comparison with 51 percent below the average for the EU countries.

Actual Individual Consumption (AIC) and Volume indices of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita in PPS 2015, 2016 and 2017 EU28=100

	AIC volume index per capita			GDP volume index per capita
	2015	2016	2017	2015	2016	2017
Luxembourg	140	134	132	266	260	253
Norway	130	127	127	156	145	146
Switzerland	131	126	124	165	160	156
Germany	122	122	122	124	124	124
Austria	121	119	117	129	128	127
Iceland	116	116	117	126	131	130
Denmark	116	113	114	127	126	128
United Kingdom	115	115	114	109	107	105
Belgium	114	113	112	118	118	117
Finland	114	113	112	109	109	109
Netherlands	115	111	111	130	128	128
Sweden	113	110	109	125	122	121
France	110	110	108	105	104	104
EU28	100	100	100	100	100	100
Italy	97	98	98	95	97	96
Ireland	94	94	93	178	177	181
Cyprus	91	92	92	82	84	85
Spain	89	89	89	91	91	92
Lithuania	83	85	88	75	75	78
Czechia	78	79	82	87	88	89
Portugal	82	82	82	77	77	77
Malta	79	78	78	92	94	96
Slovenia	76	76	77	82	83	85
Greece	79	77	76	69	68	67
Poland	74	74	76	69	68	70
Slovakia	76	76	76	77	77	76
Estonia	71	72	73	76	77	79
Latvia	66	65	68	64	64	67
Romania	58	65	68	56	59	63
Croatia	59	61	62	59	61	62
Hungary	63	62	62	68	67	68
Bulgaria	53	53	54	47	48	49

Source: Eurostat and SCB Source: Eurostat and SCB. Note: Norway, Iceland and Switzerland are not EU-members and are therefore not included in the EU28 average. Sorted firstly by AIC in 2016 and secondly in alphabetical order.

Definitions and explanations

Purchasing power parities (PPP) are currency conversion rates that are applied in order to convert economic indicators from national currency to artificial common currency, called Purchasing Power Standard (PPS), which equalizes the purchasing power of different national currencies and enables meaningful volume comparison between countries.

PPP is the ratio between the amount in the countries’ domestic currency that is needed in order to buy the same basket of goods and services.

GDP is firstly calculated in the domestic currency and later converted with an artificial currency, Purchasing Power Standard (PPS). GDP per capita adjusted with purchasing power reflects the difference in volume in real terms between countries.

Purchasing Power Parities

Eurostat’s publishing of Purchasing Power Parities:

The Eurostat website and database

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Statistical Database

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