Thousands took to Lisbon’s streets on Saturday to demand better living conditions at a time high inflation is making it even tougher for people to make ends meet.
Portugal is one of western Europe’s poorest countries, with government data showing more than 50 percent of workers earned less than 1,000 euros (US$1,057) per month last year. The monthly minimum wage is 760 euros.
House prices in Portugal rose 18.7 percent last year, the biggest increase in three decades, and rents have also increased significantly in part due to a speculative property bubble.
Photo: AFP
Low wages and high rents make Lisbon the world’s third-least viable city to live in, according to a study by insurance brokers CIA Landlords. Portugal’s 8.3 percent inflation rate has exacerbated the problem.
At the protest, which was organized by the “Fair Life” movement, Vitor David, a 26-year-old programmer, said he would like to move back to Lisbon one day, but had to live further out because of how expensive it was to rent in the city.
“It comes to a point in our lives that we have no hope,” he said, adding that he had already pondered moving to a wealthier European country. “It’s very hard.”
Official data show that about 20 percent of Portuguese live abroad.
“We are here so our voice is heard,” said Jose Reis, who recently graduated from university, but is still unemployed.
The Fair Life movement, which was created by people who live in Lisbon’s poorer outskirts, has said those who were already the most vulnerable before inflation soared were the ones being the hardest hit by the ongoing cost-of-living crisis.
They want higher wages, a cap on the prices of essential goods and government action on housing.
Portugal last week announced a hefty package of measures to tackle the housing crisis, but rights groups said the proposals would mean little if authorities continued to promote other policies to attract wealthy foreigners to the country, such as the Digital Nomads Visa introduced in October last year.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion