Response to interpellation 2024/25:62 on child poverty
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
The debate concerned child poverty and the government's budget. M believes that the budget does not address how child poverty is broken 1 and that the government's reforms cause working parents with low incomes to lose money while high-income earners earn more 1. M argues that the way out of poverty is through self-sufficiency, growth, and tax cuts for low- and middle-income earners 2, and that growth is the only way to reduce poverty 3 4. MP believes that the budget erodes the support systems for families with children and low incomes 5 6 and that the government prioritizes tax cuts for high-income earners 6. MP argues that single parents with lower incomes are often forced to prioritize the children's food over their own health 5. SD believes that the supplementary grant in the housing allowance is an important support for families with children 7 and that the government creates jobs by encouraging entrepreneurship 7.
Written by AI in advance and may contain errors. The numbers lead to the speech a statement builds on; check against the text below.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! Märta Stenevi has asked me what measures I and the government plan to take to break the widespread child poverty in Sweden.
Madam Speaker! The high inflation has hit Swedish households hard, not least child-rearing households. The temporary supplementary grant in the housing allowance has been an important measure to support households in a time of increased living costs.
To strengthen the economic situation for those who have had it the hardest, the government has, on four occasions, extended the temporary supplementary grant to families with children within the housing allowance. We have also increased the supplementary grant when the needs have been assessed as greatest.
When the difficult economic situation has now eased and the future prospects for households look brighter, the government proposes in the budget bill for 2025 that the supplementary grant is extended and phased down from 40 to 25 percent of the preliminary housing allowance. This is a well-considered measure to continue supporting economically vulnerable households.
The economic family policy shall contribute to a good economic standard of living for all families with children. The welfare state is important for families who are struggling, but the best tool for breaking economic vulnerability and counteracting a low economic standard is one's own income from work. Therefore, the government is actively working so that more people will enter the workforce.
The previously mentioned housing allowance is a benefit that is income-tested and thus has marginal effects. For groups that have a weak foothold in the labor market, income-tested benefits can, in a longer perspective, reduce the incentives for self-sufficiency, which is why adjustments to the allowance always need to be made with this in mind.
The Government has taken several measures to address the challenges of unemployment and economic vulnerability. The Government is working to increase both the incentives and the drivers to move from benefits to work. This is done, among other things, through an enhanced job tax credit primarily aimed at full-time workers with low and medium-high incomes, which makes it more profitable to work, as well as a full battery of measures to promote a return to work.
To combat unemployment, the government also proposes initiatives such as increased support for people who are far from the labor market and that funds be allocated for Jobbsprånget's work to offer individually tailored internships.
One of the most important measures for establishing oneself in the labor market in the long term is education. The Government therefore proposes in the budget bill for 2025 an additional 900 million kronor, including student grants, for approximately 11,000 new places in regional vocational adult education in komvux. Additionally, the grant to supervisors in lärlingsvux is doubled.
Madam Speaker! The fight against inflation has now been won. Prices are no longer rising at the same rate. But we also continue to find ourselves in a recession with high unemployment.
To curb low economic standards for families with children, it is crucial that more parents enter the workforce and secure their livelihood through their own work. More children must see their parents go to work. The best way to protect them from low economic standards is precisely work.
Märta Stenevi (MP)
Madam Speaker! I thank the Minister for the answer, but it does not answer the question. Instead, the answer concerns educational measures for adults to help people in unemployment to get into work. These are very important measures. Independent livelihood for all, I believe, is a goal that everyone in the chamber shares. I hope that is the case in any event.
But my question was about measures to break child poverty. The Minister points to the job tax credit and claims that it "is primarily aimed at full-time workers with low and medium-high incomes and makes it more profitable to work".
Madam Speaker! I asked the Riksdag's investigation service to look at how the government's budget affects two typical households. One household consists of a single mother with two children living in a rented apartment. She works as a childcare worker and travels by public transport. She cannot afford to go on holiday, but she has had a buffer in an ISK for unforeseen expenses for some time.
She has a rent of 9,000 kronor a month, which is an average rent in Stockholm, and she has a median salary for her profession in Stockholm according to Kommunals statistics, 26,600 kronor. She also has housing allowance. She commutes by public transport to a preschool in Danderyd from Tensta every day. We can call her Anna.
The second household in the investigation consists of two married adults with two children, one of whom lives at home. That household lives in a villa in Danderyd, and they also have a vacation home. They will go on holiday to Mexico with the whole family this summer, and they both have substantial savings in an ISK.
They work as marketing manager and HR manager respectively and have the median salary in their professions according to Ledarnas statistics. They plan to use rut and rot fully during 2025, as they are going to renovate the kitchen and have cleaning every week. Caroline and Fredrik commute in their respective cars to their workplaces in central Stockholm every day.
Madam Speaker! Anna, who works full-time and supports her two children, will lose 483 kronor every month due to the government's budget. She does, however, receive barely 130 kronor from the job tax credit. But that small amount is very quickly consumed by the phased-out temporary housing allowance.
Caroline and Fredrik also work full-time. They, however, will earn 10,764 kronor from the government's budget every month. Anna loses almost 500 kronor, and Caroline and Fredrik earn almost 11,000 kronor every month from the reforms that are in the government's budget.
Madam Speaker! I would like to ask the question again to the Minister: What is the government doing to reduce child poverty in Sweden?
Caroline Högström (M)
Madam Speaker! The Minister has many good points in his speech and describes important reforms to get more people into work, especially in a difficult economic time.
The best insurance against future exclusion is to see one's parents go to work. This, Madam Speaker, is not just something we Moderates say. Statistics Sweden also noted that young people with unemployed parents run an almost 70 percent higher risk than others of ending up outside of the labor market and studies. The risk is highest within the large metropolitan counties of Stockholm, Västra Götaland, and Skåne.
If one seriously wants to break exclusion and reduce child poverty, the way forward is the work principle. If more, in this case parents, move from benefits to jobs, we will also see more social mobility in the future. Therefore, the government's focus on precisely the work principle is crucial.
More and more grants do not break the exclusion but risk further passivizing people. With the government's extensive reforms in areas such as the school sector and within the social insurance system, where for example reforms are made for better rehabilitation so that more people return to work after illness, or for that matter the reforms of labor immigration or in the labor market area, we have a common concerted effort to ensure that more people secure that job. It is sometimes a first job, and in other cases a return to work after a difficult time.
We know that a job is not just a salary. It is a context, and it is routines and a sense of security. The focus on the work line must be wholehearted to have an effect. In this case, one can always rely on a Moderate-led government. We Moderates know that hard work and money earned by oneself provide more opportunities, and it strengthens both self-confidence and independence. This should probably not be underestimated, especially in today's society. Here, the government has the right focus. It is the work line that will solve this moving forward. That is where the focus in large must be.
With that, I would like to congratulate the Minister on this remarkable day! It has been a fun evening in the chamber.
Daniel Persson (SD)
Madam Speaker! I want to begin by thanking the Minister for the answer to the interpellation. This is an important issue to debate and highlight, and it is also important that there is a good safety net for our citizens when they find themselves in a difficult economic situation.
The median of the economic standard of households with children, that is, disposable household income per consumption unit, has increased for all types of households with children during the period 2014-2021. There is a slight decline in 2021, and there has been a slight economic dip for all households with children. The income has not decreased nominally, but a contributing cause to this decrease is inflation, which is worth noting. There are also large differences in economic standard between different types of households with children, and these differences are also persistent over time. It also affects whether the child or children live full-time, part-time, or alternately with the parent.
Madam Speaker! Approximately one in ten families with children lives in economic vulnerability, which means it concerns about 200,000 children in Sweden. Naturally, we need to work to reduce that proportion. The interpellation mentions an increase in the child allowance as an alternative, which could be a blunt tool for tackling child poverty and would be more costly than effective. The housing allowance, for example, has better precision.
Madam Speaker! To seriously combat child poverty, parents need a job to go to. Long-term benefit dependency is a vicious spiral in several respects, but particularly from an economic perspective. One of the government's primary priorities has been to combat and monitor inflation, and it has been a tough time, not least for many families with children. But as it stands now, inflation has been defeated, and the government is working to create better conditions for the economy to grow in the long term. Good economic growth lays the foundation for a society that grows and becomes ever stronger, where more people work and support themselves.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! I believe we in this chamber can be completely in agreement that no one wants to see children grow up in poverty. No one wants children to have to go hungry or be unable to buy clothes when needed. Therefore, we in Sweden have different subsidy systems. We have social insurance benefits and, ultimately, the social assistance, which is increased in line with cost developments.
But there is also a dividing line here that becomes quite clear. Benefits are actually only about combating the symptoms of poverty, not the cause of it. If we want to combat child poverty in the long term, there is only one solution. It is questioned by the interpellator, but that more parents get a job to go to, have their own livelihood, and can support their family and their children is the way out of child poverty. It is only with a job that the long-term dependency on benefits can be broken so that one can feel hope and joy in being able to improve both one's own life and society as a whole.
That is why the work line is so important, and that is why I and the government have had a laser focus over these last two years on precisely restoring it. More children need to start the day by seeing their parents go to work, not just to counter poverty here and now, but to break the exclusion in the long term and, just as MP Högström said, be able to make a real class journey.
Breaking the exclusion will be important to combat child poverty. The child poverty that exists here today is also largely a result of the failed policy that the previous government pursued. We see, and have in recent years seen, an integration failure, which becomes very clear. Three-quarters of the children living in families with financial assistance have a foreign background.
The work that the government is now carrying out is a total overhaul of the integration policy and the migration policy. We are now tightening up and reducing migration while simultaneously fighting to improve integration. We will set higher requirements - it is a must to ensure that more move from benefits to work and that more are also integrated into Swedish society.
This is a long-term task of breaking a development that has arisen from eight years of mismanagement by the previous government. I am absolutely not interested in patching and repairing or band-aiding the symptoms, but I want to create a system that actually works. I want long-term solutions that truly reduce economic vulnerability among both adults and children. For me, it becomes very clear that it is the work line, rather than the benefit line, that is the answer to that question.
Märta Stenevi (MP)
Madam Speaker! The families I am talking about work. These children see their mothers go to work every day, but they cannot manage their bills because our safety nets have become so eroded. Now this government is contributing to making it even worse, while throwing how many billions as you like at high-income earners who work. How is that a work principle, and how does it break the cycle of child poverty?
Madam Speaker! Let me recount what a single parent who is also a member of Makalösa föräldrar says: I often only eat breakfast, a deciliter of oatmeal, in order to afford to give the children sufficient and good food. Then I eat a little of the evening meal with them, eat their possible leftovers and drink a lot of water.
Another mother says: I have gotten worse vision but cannot afford new glasses for myself. I choose to forgo prescription medicine for myself, because food is more important.
Madam Speaker! Stadsmissionen, Hyresgästföreningen, Majblomman and Röda Korset conducted a survey in February this year addressed to families with children with lower incomes, defined as 29,500 kronor for a single-parent family. These are, therefore, families where one works.
Four out of ten single parents with lower incomes state that they have had to borrow money to be able to pay for the basics during the last six months.
One in five single parents with lower income has not been able to afford to eat until full on one or more occasions during the last six months.
Almost every other single parent and every third cohabiting parent with a lower income has not been able to afford to buy nutritious food every day of the week.
Four out of ten single parents, like Anna in my example, would manage at most an increase in expenses of 1,000 kronor before it becomes difficult to pay the bills.
Madam Speaker! This survey was conducted in February while the temporary increase of the housing allowance was still in place. In just over two months, a fairly large part of that increase will disappear, and by the time the summer holidays arrive, it will be completely gone.
Anna in my example will then have 500 kronor less to move with next year than she has now, while Caroline and Fredrik will have almost 11,000 kronor more per month. The government's budget gives them 130,000 kronor more in their pocket per year.
Madam Speaker! The job tax credit does not primarily go to those with low incomes. It does not strengthen a work line. It does not reach those whose children are poor. However you calculate it, 32 percent of the cost for the job tax credit in the government's budget goes to the tenth of the population that earns the most. The tenth that earns the least from income from work, for the job tax credit only reaches them, has to share less than 1 percent of that sum. Not even 1 percent of the money, therefore, goes to that group.
Madam Speaker! I would like to know if the Minister sees any problems at all with the fact that full-time working parents have such difficulty making ends meet. Does the government see any problems with the deep inequality that exists between children in Sweden? Does the government see any problems with children growing up in families that have such small margins that they have to borrow for everyday expenses, or shall we continue to talk about migration in connection with these families not being able to put food on the table?
If one sees a problem with these growing gaps, what measures will the government implement to break child poverty in Sweden?
Caroline Högström (M)
Madam Speaker! It cannot be emphasized enough in this chamber that the way out of poverty is through self-sufficiency. Recession and sky-high inflation always have a major impact, especially on those with small margins. That is why we must equip Sweden to be economically strong in both the short and long term. That is why we must have an economy permeated by growth. It creates the prosperity, the welfare, and the protection we need.
The drivers behind work and that work must always pay off are crucial. Therefore, priorities such as strengthening the return to work through strong rehabilitation and lowering taxes, especially for low- and middle-income earners, are important. That a budget has a strong focus on growth actually benefits not only Sweden but also the individual family. It benefits the single mother if society receives more and more resources through more taxpayers. It always pays off if more people work, and it should pay off to work that extra hour.
An average citizen in Norberg Municipality, which is not particularly large, gets approximately 3,500 kronor more with the budget for 2025 compared to 2024. It is clear that it makes a difference! Tax cuts make a difference. They make it so that you have more to move with. That is why we must focus on growth. I cannot emphasize enough how crucial it is. The work principle and the drivers behind work must permeate all political work.
Daniel Persson (SD)
Madam Speaker! As this is my final contribution, I would like to take the opportunity to thank the Minister for the interpellation debate on this very important issue and, of course, also offer congratulations on the day.
Swedish households and families with children have been pressed hard in recent years by inflation, and this applies particularly to families with children with small economic margins. For about 100,000 families with children in Sweden, the supplementary allowance in the housing allowance becomes a very important support that is being extended once again. As so often, Miljöpartiet tends to see only increased allowances as the solution to tackle poverty. In its shadow budget, Miljöpartiet increased the allowances. They also usually shock-increase taxes and also increase the national debt at a very worrying rate.
We need a policy that creates jobs. The more people who work according to their ability, the more prosperity. It provides a secure welfare. To create jobs, the government has presented a policy that encourages enterprise and entrepreneurship. A good business climate creates more jobs, and it is an important part of combating child poverty.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! The interpellator does not seem particularly pleased to discuss the work line instead of the contribution line. Let me therefore speak about economic vulnerability and poverty in a slightly broader perspective. Through history, there is only one answer to how one truly reduces poverty, and that is through growth.
I understand that growth is not a favorite topic for the interpellor. But we are focusing on growth. Miljöpartiet is not exactly known for being particularly big supporters of growth. It is not uncommon to hear their members speak of degrowth instead, and their spokespeople want to set "limits" for economic development.
When we talk about poverty reduction, we must also talk about growth. What has made Sweden go from one of the poorest countries to one of the richest is precisely growth. Child poverty is a limited phenomenon rather than the common condition it once was. What has solved that problem is precisely growth.
Without growth, everyone becomes poorer. We have experienced that. After eight years of red-green rule, Sweden's growth had completely stalled. I and the entire government are now working to get it started again so that the country can become ever wealthier. It is about achieving better productivity and getting green and stable electricity running. It must pay to work and educate oneself and, above all, to move from benefits to work. But Miljöpartiet constantly opposes proposals that could increase growth.
The Green Party's answer seems to be the same all the time: to raise taxes and increase subsidies. I do not believe in that line, and I think it is quite obvious here today that there is a clear dividing line between us. I and the government believe in a society where it should pay to take risks, start companies, and educate oneself at universities. For that very reason, it is important to lower the tax for both low-income earners and those with higher incomes.
Diligence and hard work must pay off much better in Sweden. It is good for growth, and above all, it is good for the person who wants to invest in themselves and for the person who perhaps has grown up in child poverty but has managed to move away from exclusion and make a class journey. It is that kind of diligence and hard work that is good for the individual, and it is that kind of diligence and hard work that is good for society. That is what I think we should reward.
The government's line is clear: higher growth and a work line instead of a benefit line. Only in this way can we combat economic vulnerability and overall make all of Sweden wealthier.
Märta Stenevi (MP)
Madam Speaker! I think this became very difficult, because now the Minister started talking about growth and did not address these families and their situation with a single word. "Diligence and hard work must pay off" - as if childcare workers or nursing assistants were not diligent and hardworking! As if it were not more difficult to travel one or one and a half hours by public transport to and from work every day than to drive a car! This discussion is very uncomfortable. It is actually completely appalling.
Madam Speaker! Imagine a single, full-time working mother who lives in a rented apartment with two children. She travels by public transport to work every day and then back the same way. At that job, she takes care of other children and ensures that they are safe and happy and that they develop and feel well. She does not eat lunch, because the money must suffice for fruit for the kids. She does not go on holiday. She does not fly. She does not drive a car. She loses almost 500 spänn every month on the reforms in the government's budget.
Families with children and low incomes in Sweden are on their knees. They work, but they are on their knees. They turn over every single krona. They go to work every day and ensure that Sweden keeps running, but they are left with less and less to move with because our support systems are falling apart. They are being hollowed out year after year. This applies, for example, to the housing allowance, the child allowance, and the social assistance. But it can be turned around.
Making the extra housing allowance permanent would have been a start, but that is not how the government prioritizes. It costs a pittance compared to the enormous tax cuts they have chosen to prioritize for high-income earners. A single mother loses 500 kronor a month. A family with two high-income earners gets 130,000 kronor next year in the government's budget. So, one cements child poverty.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! Poverty and child poverty are overcome through the work line and increased growth. It creates the conditions for increased growth and for building Sweden richer and stronger again. Inflation has carved large holes in many people's pockets. This applies to families with children, ordinary households, pensioners, and companies – not to mention the state's various agencies and organizations. Inflation has left no one untouched, and for that very reason, it is incredibly important to get Sweden moving again and to create growth and more jobs so that more people have a job to go to. That is how we get out of poverty. That is also how we break child poverty.
I would still like to take the opportunity to thank the interpellor and the members who participated in this debate. I think it is a very important and pressing issue. There is a dividing line in this chamber between whether one thinks it is important with high taxes and high benefits or lower taxes and increased growth. I and the government are firmly convinced that poverty is best combated through increased growth.
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.