Social inequality – Half million women in Austria run a risk of poverty

When Mrs. I lost her apartment from one day to the other four years ago, she received help from Caritas. Only a week later she was able to move to her “puppet room” while she described her new house. 60 percent of people who turn to caritas as a result of poverty is female, Caritas drawn attention to a press conference on Wednesday.

“Something has to change”
565,000 women in Austria run the risk of poverty, around 143,000 massive people affected by poverty. The multiple crises have further tightened the situation in Austria, especially for women. “It is clear that something urgently needs to change,” says Doris Schmidauer, wife of federal president Alexander van der Bellen. “The subject has been with us for many, many years.”

Women are even more exposed to the burden than in previous years. “The poverty of women is not an individual fate, that is the result of a deep -rooted, social inequality,” says Schmidauer. A majority of unpaid care, work-household, childcare or care would be taken over by women.

“The salaries and pensions of women are usually lower and are often not enough to meet the necessary necessities of life,” said Doris Anzengruber, head of the Caritas Social Counseling Center in Vienna. “Poverty can meet anyone.” The crises of recent years rose the situation for those who had previously had it, especially single parents and minimal pensioners.

“Women less received 920 euros in the average pension,” Schmidauer also raised attention. “It is our common responsibility to correct this inequality,” said the political scientist on the occasion of the World Day Day on Saturday to the new government.

Through an emergency number of the new house
Mrs. I. had to leave her old apartment of 80 square meters in Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus within 14 days because she lived in front of Sublet and the tenant died. The new rent and especially the down payment could no longer afford it. She had no stay in the middle of the Corona Pandemie. “The world was gone,” she remembered that time. But an employee of the service of the labor markets offered her emergency numbers and madam I had the courage to ask for help there.

She temporarily had a chance for the Viennese homeless help, which offered a hiding place in the short term. “It was October 31, 2021, a Sunday, I will never forget that,” said Mrs. I. “The call from Caritas came on Monday, they have an apartment for me”. A week later she moved to her new, 27 square meters, “that I still have that I love to this day. I am so happy, this is the room of my dolls. “Caritas was supplied with the most important – hygienic articles, bedding and towels.

Signed by violent past
“Women who come to us often have a long suffering behind them,” said Claudia Röder, head of the Women*Housing Center of Caritas in Leopoldstadt. “Most of our customers had to experience violent relationships. Often this violence is also a trigger or amplifier for mental disorders that make it difficult for women in addition to the financial problems to retain their apartments.

The various problems are taken care of in the Women*Residential Center and in the adjacent Day Center Women*Living room. “We accept women as they are. Most stay with us in the long term, for some the stabilization and moving to a mobile apartment, “says Röder. There are also three crisis beds available that offer a hiding place for one night quickly and not -deskcratic. “There is rarely one thing about it,” said Röder.

In Vienna, hundreds of women are currently finding a roof above their heads in the different houses and emergency quarters. Women receive support in financial emergencies, for example in the social counseling centers. “To be able to help women in need quickly and easily, we are urgently dependent on donations,” said Anzengruber. That is why the organization is sought by mercy. With 25 euros, a woman gets a safe place to sleep in need, for 50 euros mothers and her children get a full shopping basket.