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CTV reports: Poland's purchasing power is declining. We investigated whether this is true and compared it with Belarus
The WTF team investigated this claim.
Poles are becoming poorer due to the country's record-high defense budget for 2025, as reported on the CTV channel's program "SASS Is Authorized to Declare." The Weekly Top Fake team investigated whether our neighbors' purchasing power is actually decreasing.
Poland's defense budget for 2025 is planned to be a record €43 billion. For comparison, this is more than half of Belarus's GDP in 2024. A segment aired on the CTV television channel on January 19, 2025 stated that such spending leads to impoverishment of Poles.
"Ordinary Polish people will be paying for the government's ambitions. And this is happening while the population's purchasing power is rapidly declining. A cavalier move on the eve of Poland's presidential elections," said the voice-over in the report shown on the program "SASS Is Authorized to Declare."
Purchasing power reflects how many goods and services the population can afford with their average monthly income. If prices stay the same or rise slower than people's incomes, purchasing power increases. When inflation outpaces income growth, people find it harder to purchase the same goods and services they could previously afford. December 2024 prices show a 4.8% increase in comparison to December 2023 prices in Poland. Statistics on the average earnings in Poland for 2024 have not yet been published, however, data is available for the first nine months. Nominal average monthly wages have increased by 14.1% compared to the previous year.
Nielsen, a research company that calculates per capita purchasing power annually in 42 European countries, also notes that Poles are becoming wealthier. In 2022, Poland's per capita purchasing power amounted to just over €9,200. In 2023, this figure rose to €10,900. By 2024, it exceeded €12,500.
In a ranking of 42 countries, Poland holds 27th place. In the 2024 ranking, Belarus ended up among the bottom three countries in terms of purchasing power, alongside Kosovo and Ukraine.
