{"id":461674,"date":"2026-08-03T13:59:30","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T11:59:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/08\/03\/iran-la-bce-timori-delle-famiglie-per-redditi-reali-il-vero-nodo-per-le-prospettive-di-crescita\/"},"modified":"2026-08-03T16:20:21","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T14:20:21","slug":"iran-ecb-flags-households-real-income-fears-as-the-crux-for-growth-prospects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/08\/03\/iran-ecb-flags-households-real-income-fears-as-the-crux-for-growth-prospects\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran: ECB flags households\u2019 real\u2011income fears as the crux for growth prospects"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Brussels \u2013 Consumer&nbsp;confidence \u201chas deteriorated <span>markedly<\/span>\u201d in the wake of the war in Iran and the resulting rise in fuel and energy prices. This implies a lower propensity to consume, which could <strong>worsen if the belief in persistent, non\u2011recoverable income losses were to take hold.<\/strong> This is the finding of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ecb.europa.eu\/press\/economic-bulletin\/focus\/2026\/html\/ecb.ebbox202605_02~0100593e6a.en.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">an analysis by the European Central Bank<\/a>, which examines consumption trends following the conflicts in the Middle East.<\/p>\n<p> What has already become apparent is that, for the time being, high-income households \u2013 that is, those best able to manage their resources and expenditure \u2013 have postponed discretionary spending (luxury clothing and footwear or sports equipment) to a later date, and cut back on travel and non-essential services (wellness treatments and similar services). Lower-income households, on the other hand, have started to cut back on dining out and having a coffee at the caf\u00e9. <\/p>\n<p>The ECB\u2019s economists stress that, for everyone, in the face of the war in Iran, \u201c<strong>the shock is shared and directly linked to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/05\/06\/iran-the-ecb-calls-it-an-unprecedented-energy-crisis-risks-for-investment-consumption-and-aviation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">risks to energy prices<\/a><\/strong>, inflation, and real incomes.\u201d This confidence shock \u201cappears to have exerted a dampening effect on demand, which could weigh on underlying consumption momentum.\u201d This means that \u201cadditional downside risks could materialise if households were to perceive the real income losses stemming from the conflict as persistent.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In other words, \u201c<strong>if households were to perceive the real income losses stemming from the conflict as persistent and associate them with lower real purchasing power, the initial sentiment-driven slowdown could become more entrenched.<\/strong>\u201d This represents \u201can important risk\u201d to the economic outlook and the trend in supply and demand curves: a contraction in consumption is looming on the horizon, with consequent repercussions for production.<\/p>\n<p>The encouraging aspect is that, compared with the significant decline in household confidence following the first few months of the war, the general perception has improved slightly. However, it is worth noting that \u201cthe close relationship between consumer confidence and consumption growth suggests that <strong>there could be renewed challenges to consumption if the recent recovery in confidence were to prove temporary.<\/strong>\u201d The continuation of hostilities therefore does not bode well for the eurozone\u2019s economic outlook.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Experts at the European Central Bank note that the climate of mistrust can be reversed, but perceptions of a loss of purchasing power are weighing on demand, with knock-on effects on the production side<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":494,"featured_media":269116,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25705],"tags":[26112,26788,33392,26151,25983,27569,27337],"class_list":["post-461674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-bce-en","tag-consumi-en","tag-energia","tag-bank-central-en-en","tag-families-en","tag-iran-in-2","tag-middle-east-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/494"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461674"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461674\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":461675,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461674\/revisions\/461675"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}