“They live on benefits.” A statement that has been repeated in Slovakia for years. Most people associate it with poor people and especially Roma communities. Almost always, when the living standards of the majority population deteriorate, this sentence becomes a shorthand description of the social system in political debates and on social networks.

This is a myth. “When people talk about the social system, they usually mean benefits for the unemployed. However, they forget that the largest part of it is pensions and healthcare,” pointed out Viliam Páleník, a researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Slovak Academy of Sciences and president of the Employment Institute.

• Žije väčšina Rómov z dávok? Ide vraj o MÝTUS, ktorý nie je podložený ČÍSLAMI. In: iStream. 21.01.2026. https://www.istream.sk/zije-vacsina-romov-z-davok-ide-vraj-o-mytus-ktory-nie-je-podlozeny-cislami/