THE STANDARD OF LIVING IN RURAL POPULATION OF POLAND

Abstract

Polish rural areas face various social, economic and ecological problems. These processes greatly affect diversification of the standard of living in rural areas. The goal of the study was to assess spatial diversification of the standard of living in rural areas in Poland in 2013. In the analysis it was evaluated with Perkal’s synthetic index, known also as the zscore index. Perkal’s index was based on dozen objective descriptors concerning several life aspects. It referred to: demographics of young or able to work part of the population, housing conditions and the use of technical infrastructure, labour market, entrepreneurship and well-being of rural inhabitants. The highest standard of living was shown for rural gminas in the vicinity of urban agglomerations. The lowest standards of living were in typical rural areas with poorly developed services functions. These were mainly depopulated units located in the outskirts of NUTS 2 regions – voivodeships. The Vistula river marked the dividing line in the standards of living in rural areas of the country.