One more piece of evidence of the impact that the exorbitant rise in prices has had on the consumer's pocket is the drastic decline in their ability to save. According to data from the National Institute of Statistics (INE), the household savings rate fell 6.6 points in 2022 compared to the previous year. Specifically, it was 7.2%, the lowest since 2018, when it stood at 5.6% of its gross annual disposable income.
From then on, it began to pick up, rising to 8.2% in 2019 and reaching a record percentage of 17.7% in the first year of the pandemic, coinciding with the lockdowns. Then it fell again, standing at 13.8% of disposable income in 2021, a trend that was maintained in 2022, a year marked by the high inflation rates registered coinciding with the end of the covid crisis and the beginning of of the Ukrainian war.
The direct consequence was that families and non-profit institutions serving households increased their consumption spending by 11.5%, to 756,862 million euros, while their savings decreased by 46% compared to 2021, to 58,457. millions. At the same time, they increased the money destined for investment by 13.7%, up to 59,291 million.
The disposable income of households was 817,536 million in total, 3.6% more than in 2021. An increase that did not cushion the rise in the cost of living or their need for financing, since they required 1,753 million, the highest figure since the financial crisis of 2008. The data contrasts with the financing capacity of 57,636 million that Spanish families had in 2021.
In the last quarter of last year, the household savings rate stood at 14.5% of their disposable income, compared to 15.9% in the same quarter of 2021. The investment they made in the last three months of 2022 reached 14,529 million, 24.1% less.
