Minimum Essential Standard of Living Expenditure Budgets

This section details the Minimum Essential Standard of Living expenditure need for each household type.

The price of the basket of goods is updated for inflation for each category of expenditure, annually. The annual update of expenditure costs is undertaken in the second quarter of the year, and uses the appropriate sub-indice rates from the Consumer Price Index to chart the annual change in the prices of goods and services over a 12 month period.

This expenditure data presented here is also utilised in the Minimum Income Standard calculator, www.MISc.ie. The calculator may be used to calculate the expenditure & income needs of a variety of household types in Urban & Rural areas in various employment/income scenarios.


2023 MESL Core Budgets

The weekly core costs of a Minimum Essential Standard of Living in 2023 for all household types and compositions are available to download below.

MESL core budgets (excluding housing, childcare & effect of secondary benefits):