Republic’s prices 40% above EU average, CSO figures show

The price of goods and services in the Republic was 40 per cent above the EU average in 2020 and second only to Denmark, fresh Central Statistics Office (CSO) data reveal.

The State’s price levels of final consumption by private households has increased steadily since 2016. The price of Denmark’s goods and services is just 0.1 per cent higher than here and has fell during the same four years.

More Irish people are getting third-level education than the EU average. Our population has aged but people can expect to live healthier lives, according to the CSO’s research.

The statistics were contained in the CSO’s 2020 edition of Measuring Ireland’s Progress, which was released on Friday. It analysed progress under the topics of society, economy, environment, education and health.

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The Irish education system produced the highest number of science, technology, engineering and mathematics graduates in the European Union in 2019, with the State producing the third highest number of overall graduates in the union.

More than half of people aged 25-34 in the Republic had a third-level qualification in 2020. In contrast, just under 40 per cent of people had a third-level degree in the EU overall.

The CSO research also found that the Republic’s population has aged over the last 10 years. The population proportion of those aged 65 and over increased from 11.6 per cent in 2011 to 14.8 per cent in 2021.

Similarly, the proportion of the population aged 45-64 years also increased in the last decade, from 22.7 per cent to 25 per cent.

As well as living longer, Irish people also enjoyed improved health than the EU average.

Women in Ireland experienced 70.5 healthy life years in 2019, the third highest in the EU. Men experienced 68.6 years of their life in good health, the fourth highest in the bloc.

With regards to family make-up, more than one -third of births registered in the State during 2019 were outside of marriage. The Republic also had the third-highest fertility rate in the European Union at 1.7. The Republic and Malta had the lowest EU divorce rate in 2018.

Other trends in CSO analysis

Inward migration to the Republic fell by more than 20 per cent in the 12 months ending in April 2021. Overall, 65,200 immigrants came to the Republic last year. The majority came from the United Kingdom. The number leaving the State has also dropped. In 2012, those who emigrated came to 83,000, but just 54,000 left last year.

Meanwhile, the data also show that waste in Irish landfills reduced by more than 70 per cent between 2009 and 2019, from 1.72 to 0.47 million tonnes. But just 27 per cent of our municipal waste was recycled, below the EU average of 30 per cent.

Greenhouse gas emissions fell from 61.5 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent in 2009 to 57 million tonnes in 2011. But by 2019 they were back up to 59.8 million tonnes.