Onderzoek wijst uit: een derde Europeanen heeft geen spaargeld (en)

BERLIN - A third of Europeans have no savings at all, while in Spain and Italy half of the population is using up money put aside, a survey carried out by the German pollster TNS on behalf of ING Bank shows.

The study was carried out on over 14,000 adults in Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey and the UK.

The country with the fewest savers was Romania, where almost half (48%) of respondents said they have no savings, while Luxembourg had the most (89%).

The evolution of personal savings in the past year showed they decreased among 52 percent of Italians and 47 percent of Spaniards. In Turkey and Great Britain, however, almost half of their citizens were able to set aside more money in the past 12 months.

Asked whether they were happy with the state of their savings, Dutch and German were the most happy (47% and 46%), while Czechs, Italians and Spaniards the most unhappy (38% and 36%).

Most respondents - over two thirds - said they were not able to spend as much on hobbies, clothes and body care. Education and health were the least touched.

On average, there are more Europeans who say they would be able to live from their savings for three months (49%) than those who say they could not (47%).