Social policies have a central role to play in addressing some of Croatia’s key challenges as described in Chapter 2. Adequate and accessible social support – both in cash and in kind – are needed to ensure decent living standards for the most vulnerable groups in society, include seniors and those living in rural areas. Social services have a key role to play in boosting employment by reducing the burden of unpaid work, notably on women. A policy priority for Croatia must also be to further promote the social‑economic inclusion and well-being of disadvantaged groups and minorities, and to fight discrimination.
OECD Reviews of Labour Market and Social Policies: Croatia 2025
Public social expenditures in Croatia are comparable to those in OECD countries. In 2021, Croatia spent about 22.5% of its GDP on cash benefits and social and health services (Figure 5.1). This is slightly above the OECD average of 22.1%, well above the share spent in neighbouring Hungary (18.4%) and below the share spent by Slovenia (24.5%). Croatia dedicates a relatively high share of its GDP to pensions (8.9%, compared to an OECD average of 8%), as do several Central European OECD countries, such as Czechia, Poland and Slovenia. Spending on income support for the working-age population is also relatively high. Meanwhile, Croatia spends less on health and social services than OECD countries do on average.
Comparatively high expenditures on working-age income support in Croatia reflect primarily large spending on incapacity benefits. This is illustrated in Figure 5.2, which shows a breakdown of working-age income support in Croatia over time, comparing it to spending in a selection of OECD countries. In the years before the COVID‑19 crisis, spending on incapacity benefits alone accounted for nearly 3% of GDP, making up around 60% of overall spending on working-age income support in Croatia. This is nearly twice the share spent in peer OECD countries. This high expenditure share reflects high numbers of people receiving disability pensions, which however have already declined by around 55% since their peak in 2010. War veterans, notably from Croatia’s War of Independence, have favourable qualifying conditions for disability pensions and are a large recipient group. By contrast, spending on unemployment benefits has been low and remarkably stable during the years of the labour market recovery, partly because only a small share of jobseekers in Croatia receive such benefits. Spending on minimum-income benefits, including Croatia’s Guaranteed Minimum Benefit, is also very low, at only about 0.2% of GDP (0.5% in the OECD on average). In 2020, the first year of the COVID‑19 crisis, spending across all four benefit categories increased, from 4.6% to 5.5% of GDP in total. However, this reflects in part the hefty 8.5% drop in Croatia’s GDP during that year.
Public social expenditure by broad social policy area, in percentage of GDP, in 2021
Note: Countries are ranked by descending order of public social expenditure as a percentage of GDP. Spending on Active Labour Market Programmes (ALMPs) are not shown because they cannot be split into cash and services; however, it is included in the level of total public spending shown in brackets. Income support to the working-age population refers to spending on the following SOCX cash categories: incapacity benefits, family cash benefits, unemployment and other social policy areas categories. For information on methodology and the underlying social expenditure programme data, see the SOCX manual.
Source: OECD (2025), Social expenditure aggregates (dataset), https://data-explorer.oecd.org/s/351 (accessed 30 August 2025).
One implication of this benefit structure is that the Croatian redistributive system is not very effective at supporting the most vulnerable households. According to data from the OECD Income Distribution Database (OECD, 2025[1]), working-age people in the top and in the bottom quintiles of the income distribution receive virtually the same shares of total cash transfers, around 21% in 2022. While Croatia is not an outlier relative to OECD countries in this respect, OECD countries with more comprehensive means‑tested benefits pay upwards of 30%, in some cases even over 40%, of working‑age cash benefits to those in the lowest income quintile. Overall, taxes and transfers in Croatia roughly cut in half the share of people living in poverty, compared to an effect of two‑thirds across OECD countries on average.
By contrast, the overall redistributive capacity of the tax and benefit system in Croatia, measured by the difference in the Gini Index before and after taxes and transfers, is in line with the OECD average. This implies that Croatia’s moderate inequality in disposable household incomes (see Chapter 2) mainly reflects moderate inequality in market incomes, which is broadly in line with the levels observed in Czechia, Poland and Slovenia, but also Denmark.
Cash social spending by policy branch as a percentage of GDP, Croatia (2013‑2021) and selected OECD countries (2021)
Note: Expenditures in the categories “unemployment” and “minimum-income” are primarily for unemployment benefits and the Guaranteed Minimum Benefit, respectively. “Incapacity” includes spending on various disability pensions and paid sick leave. “Family” includes maternity / paternity and parental-leave benefits, as well as other family allowances including child benefits.
Source: OECD (2025), Social expenditure aggregates (dataset), https://data-explorer.oecd.org/s/351 (accessed 30 August 2025).
5.1.1. Few jobseekers in Croatia are covered by unemployment benefits, and payment levels substantially drop after three months of benefit receipt
Workers in Croatia who lose their job are protected against income losses through a single‑tier unemployment benefit, which is characterised by comparatively high – but rapidly declining – payment levels. In the initial months of an unemployment spell, a jobseeker with a long work history and previous earnings at the average wage is entitled to about 70% of their previous net income in benefits (Figure 5.3, Panel A). This is “net replacement rate” is relatively high in OECD comparison: across OECD countries in 2024, the net replacement rate in the second month of a benefit spell averaged 59% including potential top‑ups. Only in six OECD countries do benefit recipients receive a greater share of their previous income in benefits than in Croatia early in their benefit spell. However, jobseekers in Croatia who remain on benefits for longer need to get by on much lower incomes, as the payment rate drops by nearly half after three months of benefit receipt. The resulting net replacement rate for longer spells is rather low compared to many OECD countries: in the seventh month of a benefit spell, for example, the same jobseeker would only receive 35% of their previous income in benefits, compared to 50% across OECD countries on average. This strong degressivity in unemployment benefits, and the consequently low benefit levels for jobseekers with longer spells, is an element that Croatia shares with several Central and Eastern European OECD countries, including Czechia, Hungary and the Slovak Republic.
Note: Panel A.: Net replacement rates give the share of previous net income replaced by unemployment benefits and top-ups for a single person with previous earnings at the average wage in the 2nd and 7th month of registered unemployment. Calculations are for a 40‑year‑old single person without children who has been continuously employed since the age of 18 in full-time employment. Panel B: The number of unemployed corresponds to the annual average of individuals considered as unemployed according to the ILO definition. The Pseudo-coverage rate gives the number of benefit recipients as a percentage of unemployed.
Source: OECD (2025), Net replacement rates in unemployment (dataset), https://data-explorer.oecd.org/s/352 (accessed 15 August 2025) (Panel A) and OECD (2025), Social Benefit Recipients (database), (OECD Social Benefit Recipients Database | OECD) (accessed 10 August 2025) (Panel B).
A key policy challenge for Croatia is that only a small share of jobseekers receive unemployment benefits. In 2022, the number of unemployment benefit recipients relative to all ILO unemployed, the so‑called “pseudo-coverage rate”, equalled about 23%, up from a low of 16% in 2015 (Figure 5.3, Panel B). Even at the peak of the labour market crisis in 2013/14, when over 300 000 people in Croatia were looking for a job, only about one‑in-five of them received unemployment benefits. Earlier OECD work has shown that unemployment benefit coverage in Croatia is lower than in most OECD countries (OECD, 2018[2]). This reflects a combination of comparatively short maximum benefit durations;1 a large share of jobseekers who are young or have short previous employment spells and therefore lack the employment record to qualify for unemployment benefits, and long-term unemployed who have exhausted their entitlements; and the absence of a second-tier unemployment assistance benefit scheme as it exists in many OECD countries. Moreover, activity-related eligibility criteria for unemployment benefits receipt are stricter in Croatia than in most OECD countries (Immervoll et al., 2022[3]).
Croatia started addressing some of these issues through a recent amendment to the Labour Market Act. This legislative change slightly increased in the benefit replacement rate for jobseekers in the 91st to the 180th day of a benefit spell (i.e. approximately in the 4th to the 7th month) from 30% to 35% of previous earnings. For young people below the age of 30, the minimum employment requirement to qualify for benefits was shortened from the standard nine to six months – a step well suited to improve coverage among NEETs with some recent work experience.
5.1.2. Croatia’s minimum-income support system is fragmented, and benefit adequacy is very low
Low-income households in Croatia who struggle to make ends meet from own resources may be entitled to support from different national and local minimum-income schemes. However, these schemes often do not effectively prevent poverty for the most vulnerable, because the support they provide is inadequate and because the different schemes are insufficiently integrated and lack predictability and consistency across localities. Croatia’s primary tool for providing support to vulnerable households is the Guaranteed Minimum Benefit (GMB), an income‑ and asset-tested cash benefit administered by the recently established Croatian Institute for Social Work (CISW). Croatia registered around 44 000 recipients of GMB in December 2024, 60% less than the recipient number in 2013. Households who receive the GMB are also entitled to a monthly housing cost allowance as a top-up, for which Croatia’s 556 towns and municipalities can freely set the payment rate above a national minimum of 30% of the GMB. However, even though GMB receipt is a prerequisite for entitlement to the housing cost allowance and both schemes are foreseen in the Social Welfare Act, an integrated information system is lacking and the CISW only receives aggregate statistics on the payment of housing allowance. Independently of the GMB, the towns and municipalities additionally pay a large number of different benefits to needy households in cash or in kind, often on an ad hoc basis and without systematic asset testing. And even though the GMB is available also to seniors, Croatia introduced in 2021 the new National Benefit for the Elderly, administered by the Pension Insurance Institute, with payment rates similar to those of the GMB (see Section 5.3).
The payment levels of these minimum-income benefits are much too low to effectively prevent poverty, and lower than in most OECD countries. After its introduction in 2014, the level of GMB payments continuously declined relative to the median household income, and hence the relative poverty line, until 2023, when the base amount was raised by 25% in a context of rising living costs (Figure 5.4, Panel A). For a single working‑age adult with full work capacity, GMB and the housing cost allowance provide a combined income of less than 20% of the median equivalised household income, i.e. not even half of the amount needed to reach the poverty line.2 Payments are a bit higher for households with dependent family members, notably since Croatia raised the benefit rates for children, adults without work capacity and seniors in 2023. Still, even for these households, payment rates remain much below the amount needed to reach the poverty line. For example, the net income for a couple with two children corresponds to 29% of the median equivalised household income (Figure 5.4, Panel B).
Net income from minimum-income benefits as a percentage of the median equivalised household income, Croatia and selected OECD countries
Note: The dashed horizonal line in both panels indicates the relative poverty line of 50% of the equivalised median household income.
In Panel A, results are for a single adult without children. In Panel B, results are for a single adult without children, a jobless couple without children and a jobless couple with two children aged 4 and 6. The family is assumed to meet the requirements for social assistance and cash housing supplements.
Source: OECD (2025), tax-benefit model, version 2.7.1 (http://oe.cd/TaxBEN).
The low level of GMB payments reflects first and foremost the low level of resources allocated to minimum‑income support in Croatia (see Figure 5.2), rather than concerns about a possible lack of work incentives for employable GMB recipients. GMB recipients with full or partial work capacity have to register with the CES to qualify for benefits, where they face activity requirements and receive employment support, including through the Job+ programme (see Chapter 3). Indeed, the CES and the CISW seem to collaborate quite closely in activating and supporting employable GMB recipients. Moreover, the widening gap between GMB payments and the net minimum wage implies that, unlike in some OECD countries, taking up work pays off financially even for recipients in large households. GMB recipients who start working are also permitted to keep 50% of their benefits for three months. A concern is rather that low GMB payment levels may induce benefit recipients to supplement benefit payments with informal income from other sources, including undeclared work, rental income or the sale of agricultural produce.
Croatia initiated, in 2021, a major reform process of its social benefit system with the aim of increasing the coverage, targeting and adequacy of income support for the most vulnerable, simplifying and accelerating administrative procedures, and increasing transparency and accountability. One key element of this reform has been the merger of different minimum-income benefits and allowances for people with disabilities into a single, indexed benefit. The first phases of this process have been implemented with the adoption of the new Social Welfare Act in 2022, which established the CISW, raised GMB payment rates, and merged several energy- and housing-related benefits. In 2024, the Inclusive Supplement Act consolidated four different allowances for people with disability into a single new benefit, the Inclusive Allowance. An amendment to the Social Welfare Act, which entered into force in April 2025, increased the payment rates of different social benefits, including the GMB.
5.1.3. Various policy initiatives aim at building institutional capacity for a coherent provision of key social services
Besides low coverage and adequacy of income support benefits, a major challenge for the support of vulnerable groups in Croatia is the patchy provision of social services. Particularly rural and remote localities struggle to organise an adequate provision of social support and care for the older people and those with disabilities, at-risk families, children and young people, disadvantaged minorities (see Box 5.1) and other vulnerable groups. This reflects a lack of financial resources, a shortage of local providers and care professionals as well as insufficient public capacity.
Croatia is taking active steps to ensure successful socio‑economic inclusion of national and ethnic minorities in Croatia (see Chapter 2). In the Sabor, Croatia’s Parliament, eight elected Members of Parliament represent the Albanian, Czech, Hungarian, Italian, Roma, Serb, Slovak national minorities at the national level, and their rights are protected by the Constitutional Law on National Minorities. Through its Operational Programmes of National Minorities 2017‑2020 and 2021‑2024, Croatia has been providing funds for activities of umbrella associations of national minorities, and the annual state funding allocated to these associations has increased over tenfold between 2017 and 2022, to about EUR 33 million.
To address the specific challenges of Croatia’s Roma minority, comprising approximately 24 000 people and representing over 0.5% of the population, various initiatives to support Roma communities are carried out under the National Strategy for Roma Inclusion 2021‑2027. The Office for Human Rights and the Rights of National Minorities carried out a large‑scale project to map the size of the Roma population in Croatia and analyse their socio‑economic outcomes, with the aim of further improving policies for Roma inclusion. A similar survey will be carried out in 2026 to inform the following strategic framework for Roma inclusion. The government has been considering developing similar initiatives also targeted towards the other main national minorities, particularly those living in Croatia’s less developed regions.
Roma civil society organisations have been developing various projects to promote the inclusion and well-being of Croatia’s Roma communities in co‑operation with the government. The Croatian Romani Union Kali Sara (https://kalisara.hr/) organises educational and cultural activities for Roma and non‑Roma children to foster links between communities and combat negative stereotypes against Roma people. Kali Sara also invests in larger-scale infrastructure projects, such as building roads, street lighting and sewage systems that benefit Roma communities, especially in the Međimurje county in the north, which is home to a relatively large Roma population. A challenge for implementing these projects has been that they require the buy-in and collaboration of local authorities, which at times is difficult to secure.
Supported by EU funding, Croatia has been launching a number of different initiatives to improve social service provision. A cornerstone of these efforts has been the reorganised the social welfare system through the 2022 Social Welfare Act, which introduced a new social mentoring service. Through this service, 253 professional mentors provide intensive support to highly disadvantaged groups, including long-term unemployed jobseekers, GMB recipients, people with disabilities, and at-risk young people, with the aim of activating them and supporting them with their social and labour market integration. The Make‑a‑Wish public-works programme, through which the CES supports the employment of unemployed women who are above 50 years or hard to place, has had a very positive impact on the provision of care services in many localities (see next subsection). A recent project carried out jointly with the World Bank established methodological foundations for mapping poverty and social exclusion at regional and local level using various sources of administrative data with the aim of improving the targeting of social support.
Croatia has been making progress in reducing gender inequalities, but there is more work to be done. Women and girls in Croatia do well in education at all levels, with tertiary enrolment rates of women clearly surpassing those of men (Morrica et al., 2019[4]). Nonetheless, women in Croatia lag men in both employment rates and earnings, even if these gender gaps are narrower than in many OECD countries (see Chapter 2). Differences in job quality remain a concern, including the greater share of employed women working on temporary contracts, and notably very short contracts. And while the gender pensions gap is lower than in the EU on average, particularly single older women face a very high poverty risk in Croatia. The European Institute for Gender Equality ranks Croatia towards the bottom among EU countries in their index of gender equality, with room to improve particularly the equality in access to decision making positions and gender equality in time use. However, the institute has also been observing a gradual convergence towards the EU average, with scores having risen over the last decade along various dimensions (EIGE, 2024[5]).
5.2.1. The shortage of formal care services causes a large unpaid-care burden, borne primarily by women
The high burden from unpaid work for many women is a major source of gender inequalities in Croatia. While the gender gap in paid work is relatively low in Croatia, women in Croatia spend nearly 20 more hours per week on unpaid work than men – the highest value across European countries ahead of Italy and Austria (Eurofound, 2022[6]). Consequently, Croatia has the largest gender gap in total hours worked (counting both paid and unpaid) of all European countries.
The low availability of formal care services is one main reason for this. Early childhood education and care (ECEC) services in Croatia suffer from insufficient capacity, both in infrastructure (number of facilities and places) and staffing. As a result, participation in ECEC is low compared to most OECD countries (Figure 5.5): only about 71% of 3‑5 year‑olds are enrolled, a lower share than in all but a few OECD countries (OECD average of 87%). Participation rates for the youngest are close to the OECD average, at 34% vs. 36% among below‑3‑year‑olds. Croatia has been increasing the capacity of childcare institutions with the target of raising the participation rate of above‑3‑year‑olds to 90% by 2026, and further to 96% by 2030 (OECD, 2025[7]). The long-term care (LTC) system in Croatia is also strongly underdeveloped, with most care being provided informally by families and relatives (for a more detailed discussion, see the Croatia’s Accession Review prepared for the OECD Health Committee (OECD, forthcoming[8])). While an estimated one‑in-three seniors in Croatia has LTC needs, only around 3% are cared for outside the family in organised forms of residential care or in community care. Of households in need of long-term care in 2016, 34% were not using professional homecare services for financial reasons, and 11% because services were not available (European Commission, 2021[9]; OECD, 2023[10]). For both ECEC and LTC, geographic inequalities in the availability of services are large, and access much lower in rural and less developed parts of the country.
The resulting care burden is mainly picked up by women: more than one‑in-four (27%) women between the ages of 25‑64 who were inactive but wanting to work in 2023 did not do so because they were caring for children or adults with disabilities (EU average of 22%; Eurostat (2025[11])). This also reflects gender norms in Croatia, which however appear to have been changing: In a 2024 Eurobarometer survey (European Commission, 2024[12]), nearly half (45%) of Croatian respondents agreed with the statement that the most important role of a woman is to take care of her home and family, mor than across EU countries on average (38%), but a substantial 15 p.p. less than still in 2017. Equally nearly half (48%) of respondents agreed that the most important role of a man is to earn money (EU average of 42%), a decline of 7 p.p. relative to 2017.
Share of children enrolled in early childhood education and care services or primary education by age, 2021
Note: Early childhood education and care services (ISCED level 0 and other registered services) or primary education (ISCED 2011 Level 1). For 0‑2 year‑olds, data refer to 2018 (Chile, the United Kingdom) and 2019 (Japan). For 3‑5 year‑olds, data refer to 2018 (United States) and 2019 (Belgium, Greece). OECD is an unweighted average (excludes Canada where no data are available).
Source: OECD (2025), OECD Family Database, indicator PF3.2 Enrolment in childcare and pre‑school. (www.oecd.org/els/family/database.htm) (accessed 15 September 2025).
5.2.2. Croatia reserves two months of paid parental leave for fathers, but take‑up is very low
Paid leave entitlements for parents in case of childbirth are broadly in line with those in many OECD countries (OECD, 2022[13]), and part of these entitlements are reserved specifically for fathers:
Paid maternity leave: Mothers are entitled to a total of 30 weeks of maternity leave, from 28 days before the expected date of birth up until the child reaches the age of six months. Out of this period, 14 weeks (including the four weeks before childbirth) are compulsory; the remaining 16 weeks are optional and can be (partly) transferred to the father. During their maternity leave, mothers receive 100% of their previous salary.3 Compared to OECD countries, paid maternity leave in Croatia is relatively long (OECD average of 18.5 weeks in 2022); only about half of OECD countries compensate 100% of the mother’s salary during the maternity leave.
Paid paternity leave: In 2022, Croatia introduced ten days of paternity leave, compensated at 100% of the net salary, in line with the requirements of the 2019 EU Directive on Work-Life Balance for Parents and Carers. The entitlement was increased to 20 working days in 2025.
Paid parental leave: Parents are entitled to parental leave for six months (26 weeks), plus an additional two months (8.7 weeks) reserved for the second parent, typically the father.4 Paid parental leave can be taken once a child reaches the age of six months up to the child’s eighth birthday. During this period, parents receive a compensation corresponding to their full salary, with a benefit floor and ceiling of around EUR 500 and EUR 3 000. Compared to OECD countries, paid parental leave in Croatia is relative short for mothers (OECD average of 32.3 weeks in 2022), and in line with the OECD average for fathers (OECD average of 8.1 weeks in 2022).
Since paid leave for parents in Croatia is linked to the compulsory health insurance, coverage is broad: besides employed and self‑employed people, also unemployed and inactive parents, including students and retirees, are entitled to paid leave benefits if they have been resident in Croatia for at least five years.
Even though two months of paid parental leave are reserved exclusively for the second partner, take‑up among fathers remains low. In 2024, fathers accounted for only 3.8% of all beneficiaries of parental leave payments. In a Eurobarometer survey on the work-life balance, which however dates back to 2018, Croatia has one of the largest gender gaps in respondents’ intention to take parental leave (European Commission, 2018[14]). At that time, 58% of respondents (and more women than men) named a greater financial compensation as the main factor that could encourage more fathers to take parental leave; however, those financial motives may have somewhat lost importance in the meantime given that Croatia significantly increased the payment ceilings since.
5.2.3. The Make‑a-Wish programme is bringing social care services into underserved localities while boosting female employment
An effective and innovative solution for bringing basic home care services into underserved rural communities in Croatia has been the Make‑a-Wish (Zaželi) programme, funded since 2017 under the ESF/ESF+. This public-works programme provides funding to local and regional authorities and NGOs to employ jobless women with no more than upper-secondary education for the provision of care services to the local population of seniors and infirm. To be eligible for participation, women must be registered as unemployed with the CES; priority is given to women in the local community who are vulnerable or hard to employ. Programme participants, who are selected with the support of the Social Welfare Centres, receive a full-time contract at the minimum wage for the duration of the programme and can receive formal vocational training.5
While the main aim of the programme had initially just been to promote employment among unemployed women with lower levels of education and employability, Make‑a-Wish has been making a substantial contribution to delivering care services and supporting the independent living of vulnerable seniors. This is true particularly in a context where shortages of care professionals, in part due to high emigration, have been one of the obstacles for expanding the provision of care services particularly in rural areas. Demand for participation in the programme is high, with long waiting lists, and many of the participants are anchored in their local communities. In that sense, the programme may provide a template for how Croatia could expand care services in less developed regions. Make‑a-Wish was extended by a further four years up to 2027, with an earmarked ESF+ allocation of EUR 210 million, though with a modified programme design and target group.6 Eventually, Croatia will need to dedicate additional financial means from national sources to sustainably fund the provision of long-term care services.
5.2.4. Croatia has been taking important steps to prevent and combat violence against women
Croatia ratified, in 2018, the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence (the “Istanbul Convention”) and has recently undergone a first comprehensive assessment of its implementation of this Convention (Council of Europe, 2023[15]). In this evaluation, an independent monitoring body, the Group of Experts on Action against Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (GREVIO), highlighted “the many Croatian initiatives, past and present, taken to prevent and combat violence against women”. It positively acknowledged the adoption of key policy documents, such as the National Strategy for Protection against Domestic Violence (2017‑2022),7 the National Plan for Gender Equality, and the National Plan for the Suppression of Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment (both for the period up to 2027), praising “the authorities’ commitment to incorporate gender equality and the combating of violence against women into the national policy framework”. Croatia has established a minister-level National Team for Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence, made up of the ministers responsible for family affairs and social welfare, police, health, education, administration, justice and foreign and European affairs, to co‑ordinate policy at the highest level; inter-agency teams at the county-level, which include representatives of social welfare centres, healthcare institutions, the police and judicial bodies, county-level educational authorities and civil society representatives, co‑ordinate policy implementation.
The GREVIO report positively acknowledges important recent legislative changes in Croatia, including the introduction of a consent-based definition of rape into the Criminal Code; amendments enacted in 2021 that criminalised image‑based abuse and introduced the ex officio prosecution of sexual violence offences, which were previously prosecuted upon the request of the victim; and an expansion of the definition of domestic violence in the Domestic Violence Act to include intimate relationships between partners who do not share a residence or children (Council of Europe, 2023[15]). However, it points out that the legal framework in Croatia remains largely gender‑neutral, which may affect service provision and prevention efforts. GREVIO also points to areas in which improvement is needed to reach higher levels of compliance with the requirements of the Istanbul Convention. This concerns, notably, the absence of comprehensive policies to address other forms of violence against women such as stalking, female genital mutilation, forced marriage, or forced sterilisation and forced abortion, an insufficient number of domestic‑violence shelters, and the lack of systematic and mandatory training of professionals in the social welfare and healthcare systems.
The prevalence of violence against women remains difficult to assess, and available statistics may not be very reliable and are often not easily comparable across countries. At the EU level, a new survey on gender-based violence against women and other forms of inter-personal violence (EU-GBV) aims at assessing the prevalence of violence in order to address the requirements of the Istanbul Convention. In first results from this survey, 28% of ever‑partnered women in Croatia report having experienced psychological, physical or sexual violence by an intimate partner; in about two‑thirds of EU countries the rate is even higher than this (Eurostat, 2025[16]). In the same survey, over one‑in-three (36%) women in Croatia report having experienced sexual harassment at work, a share that is somewhat higher than across EU countries on average (Eurostat, 2025[17]).8 Drawing on Eurostat data based on administrative sources, the European Institute for Gender Equality calculated that the rate of female victims of intentional homicide in 2018 was the lowest in Croatia among 24 EU Member States and the United Kingdom, at 0.38 per 100 000 inhabitants (EIGE, 2021[18]). Croatia introduced femicide as a new criminal offence into its criminal code in 2024.
Croatia operates a three‑tier pension system, which consists of a pay-as-you-go public pension scheme, created in its current form through a comprehensive reform of Croatia’s previous public scheme in 1998, a mandatory and a voluntary private funded scheme, both introduced in 2002.9 Croatia’s public pension scheme is broad in coverage, providing old-age, disability and survivors’ pensions to both employees and the self-employed, plus a few additional groups.
The current statutory retirement age in Croatia in broadly in line with the average across OECD countries. In 2025, the normal retirement age is 65 years for men (OECD average of 64.6 years in 2024; OECD (2025[19])), and 63 years and nine months for women (OECD average of 63.8 years), with women’s retirement age currently increasing by three months each year to reach 65 years in 2030. A 15‑year minimum‑contribution period is required for people to qualify for an old-age pension. Workers with long contribution records of at least 41 years can retire at age 60 without penalty.10 Early retirement is permitted five years before the normal retirement age for workers who have contributed for at least 35 years. Deferred retirement is possible with an accrual bonus provided for a maximum of five years, i.e. up to the age of 70. The qualifying conditions for the public scheme also extend to the statutory individual scheme.
Croatia’s public scheme is generally rather redistributive, which reflects notably a relatively generous minimum pension. This minimum pension is non-means-tested, with the payment level depending on a person’s qualifying years. Its average payment equalled two‑thirds (66.6%) of the average pension payment in August 2025. The share of minimum-pension beneficiaries has been rising over time, reaching 26.3% of all pensioners in August 2025. At the upper end, Croatia caps pensions at 3.8 times the pension for average earnings, while contributions are paid up on earnings up to six times average earnings. This implies in principle that high-income earners disproportionately contribute to the system, though only very few people reach the maximum pension. Croatia has a larger number of special regimes, which permit people with a special societal or professional status to receive pensions at more favourable conditions. Over 15% of all pensioners benefit of such rules, the most important group being that of war veterans.
Croatia carried out a major reform of the pension system in 2018, which took effect in January 2019 but parts of which were taken back under major public pressure only nine months later. The initial reform combined various components aimed at improving the system’s financial sustainability, notably by extending people’s working lives, and at increasing adequacy. Key elements included: an increase in the retirement age by two years, to 67 years, by 2033 for both women and men, and by one year, to 61, for workers with long qualifying periods; an increase by two years in the age permitting early retirement, to 62; higher penalties for early retirement and larger rewards for postponed retirement; a provision that permitted early retirees to combine pension receipt and part-time work; a six‑month credit to mothers’ contribution record for each child born or adopted; a more generous indexation rule for the public pension scheme; and changes to the rules of the statutory funded pension that gave younger cohorts the option, upon retirement, of giving up their entitlements to a pension from their individual account in exchange for corresponding credits in the public scheme, if this was more favourable. Following massive public protests and the collection by trade unions of nearly 750 000 signatures in favour of a referendum (in a country with a total population of around 4.5 million people), Croatia revoked the most controversial parts of the reform in October 2019, reversing the increases in the normal retirement age, the retirement age for workers with long qualifying periods, and the age threshold for early retirement.
In June 2025, Croatia adopted a new Pension Insurance Act that will raise average pensions while improving incentives to work for longer. The main changes include the introduction of an annual pension supplement tied to years of service, a more favourable pension adjustment formula, and allowing pensioners to work full-time while retaining 50% of their pension. The reform also raises the minimum pension, increases credited service for mothers for each child, and – from January 2026 – abolishes early retirement penalties for pensioners turning 70.
5.3.1. Pension adequacy is low because working lives are short
Many people in Croatia experience a substantial drop in their disposable income upon retirement as the level of pensions is low (European Commission, 2024[20]). According to Eurostat data, the gross median pension income of 65‑74 year‑olds equalled only about 35% of gross median earnings from work of 55‑64 year‑olds in 2024.11 This is the lowest Aggregate Replacement Ratios among EU countries, and much below the EU average of 60% (Eurostat, 2025[21]). Low pensions in Croatia result from generally short working lives (see Chapter 2), with Croatia’s War of Independence, Croatia’s deep recession following the global financial crisis, and relatively high rates of informality further supressing contribution periods. Only a relatively small share of pensioners (19.6% in August 2025) receive a pension based on 40 or more qualifying years, though this figure has been rising; nearly 40% have less than 30 years of contributions. While women are overrepresented among pensioners with shorter qualifying periods, the gender gap in pension payments is substantially lower in Croatia than in the EU on average, at 19.3% in 2024 (EU average of 24.5%). This mirrors Croatia’s relatively narrow gender gap in employment rates and earnings, and the low incidence of part-time work (see again Chapter 2).
Croatia’s funded private pension schemes have had little impact on adequacy so far, though this should start changing for the coming pensioner generations. When introducing its mandatory private scheme in 2002, Croatia made the scheme compulsory only for cohorts born in 1962 and after, i.e. those younger than 40 at the time, as well as for new labour market entrants. Older cohorts could voluntarily sign up (if they were between 40 and 50 years at the time) or did not have access (those older than 50 years). The first cohorts for whom the scheme was mandatory are therefore yet to reach the normal retirement age. Moreover, the returns on people’s individual accounts have often been meagre, and indeed lower than the corresponding public pension entitlements would have been if contributors had only contributed to the public scheme. In October 2011, Croatia therefore gave people the option to opt out of the mandatory scheme at the time of pension take‑up, and to transfer their entitlements over into the public scheme, if this was more favourable – an option that 99% of people have made use of. However, people’s individual pension accounts should make a growing contribution to pension adequacy as the system matures and future cohorts of retirees will have had the chance to save for longer.
The future adequacy of the Croatian pension system under the rules in place up to the 2025 pension reform was in line with that in many OECD countries. According to simulations from the OECD pensions model, a person entering the labour market in 2022 at age 22, working at average earnings throughout their career, and retiring at the earliest possible age without penalty was entitled to a pension corresponding to 60% of their previous net earnings (see Figure 5.6). This net replacement rate was slightly below the OECD average (61% in 2022), but above those in many OECD countries including in the Baltics, Japan and Korea, and the Anglophone countries. Low-wage workers in Croatia received higher relative pensions, with the net replacement rate of a person having worked at 50% of average earnings reaching 79% (OECD average of 73%). For high‑wage workers, the net replacement rate in Croatia was also higher than the OECD average (61% vs. 53%). The new Pension Insurance Act adopted in June 2025 should increase pension adequacy, including through the more favourable pension adjustment formula, the payment of the annual pension supplement, increases in the minimum pension, and the additional credited service to mothers for raising children.
To improve the incomes of vulnerable seniors without an old-age pension, Croatia introduced in 2021 the National Benefit for the Elderly, a non-contributory income‑tested cash benefit administered by the Croatian Pension Insurance Institute. The benefit is available to those above the age of 65 years who lack the 15‑year insurance period required for entitlement to an old-age pension, in many cases non‑working spouses. However, the payment level of the national benefit for the elderly is much below the poverty threshold, at around EUR 155 per month from January 2025, and receiving the benefit disqualifies seniors from receiving the GMB and the related housing cost allowance. Unlike the GMB, the national benefit for the elderly is not asset-tested. Receipt numbers have been rising, to about 19 000 people in August 2025. Many local authorities in Croatia provide additional support for low-income seniors through local‑level cash benefits and in-kind support.
Pension net replacement rates as a share of previous earnings, 2022
Note: Net replacement rates give the theoretical future entitlements of a person entering the labour market in 2022 at age 22 and retiring at the earliest possible age without penalty. They assume that all legislated changes to the pension system have been implemented, and do not account for the recent high rates of inflation.
Source: OECD (2023[22]), “Table 4.4. Net pension replacement rates by earnings, in percentage”, in Pensions at a Glance 2023: OECD and G20 Indicators, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/678055dd-en.
5.3.2. Pension spending is lower than the EU average and forecast to decline
Public pension expenditures in Croatia are much in line with those in other European countries, and – up to the recent pension reform – were forecast to decline relative to GDP. According to the EU Ageing Report 2024 (European Commission, 2024[23]), total gross public pension expenditure in Croatia equalled 9.0% of GDP in 2022, 2.4 p.p. below the EU average of 11.4%. Expenditures were projected to continuously decline over the next decades to reach 8.8% of GDP by 2070. This decline reflects primarily a fall in the expenditures for disability pensions; current spending on disability pensions is high in Croatia, at 1.4% of GDP, reflecting the past ease of access and the large number of disabled war veterans who receive benefits at more favourable conditions. Expenditures on old-age and early pensions alone were projected to rise until 2033 before starting to decline (Croatian Pension Insurance Institute, 2023[24]). Those numbers imply that Croatia may have had indeed some room to increase the adequacy of is public old‑age pension scheme, as it was done with the recent pension reform.
Nonetheless, Croatia’s public pension system runs a major deficit, as the number of contributors to the system is very low. In August 2025, the public pension scheme counted about 1.45 employees for each pensioner, a dependency ratio of 69%, down from over 87% in 2014 (European Commission, 2024[20]). This reflects not so much demographics as such, but again primarily the high share of pensioners per employed person. As a consequence, even with pension contribution rates similar to other countries (15% + 5% into the mandatory private account), Croatia had to finance nearly half (41%) of its public pension expenditures from the state budget in 2024. Other contributing factors to the large pension deficit have been the large share of seniors in more favourable special regimes, and the channelling of pension contributions into the mandatory private scheme.
5.3.3. There is scope to raise incentives for people to work longer
The projected rise in the old-age dependency ratio for Croatia threatens the adequacy of public pensions in Croatia even as total public pension expenditures are projected to decline, because smaller cohorts of working-age people will have to fund the pensions of a growing number of seniors. For that reason, it is crucial that Croatia raise its low employment rates (see Chapter 2), including by enabling and encouraging people to work for longer. Croatia has taken various steps in this direction, notably by raising the statutory retirement age for women, expanding the group of pensioners who can work up to half of the normal working hours while receiving their full pension, and by increasing the bonus paid for deferred retirement. Moreover, many of the policy solutions that promise being effective at extending working lives in Croatia rather lie in the areas of labour market, social and skills policy. This includes better training and support for young people during the school‑to‑work transition; policies to boost female labour force participation, notably by reducing the burden of unpaid work; and measures to increase job quality such as to permit older workers to work for longer.
However, there remains some scope for Croatia to promote longer working lives through adjustments to its pension system. This includes notably further steps to discourage early retirement, which remains relatively attractive in international comparison, and to encourage deferred retirement. Moreover, by further reducing, or entirely lifting, the restrictions on combining receipt of old-age pensions and work, Croatia could raise the employment rates and incomes of seniors while reducing their incentives to engage in undeclared work. Croatia has taken recent steps in this direction through its 2025 pension reform, allowing pensioners to work full-time while retaining half of their pension.
References
[15] Council of Europe (2023), “GREVIO Baseline Evaluation Report: Croatia”, Group of Experts on Action against Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (GREVIO), https://rm.coe.int/baseline-evaluation-report-on-croatia/1680ac76c9.
[24] Croatian Pension Insurance Institute (2023), “2024 Ageing Report - Croatia - Country Fiche on pensions projections for the 2024 round of EPC-AWG projections”, https://economy-finance.ec.europa.eu/document/download/15851ac1-873c-4121-a30c-63e5c7d600b0_en?filename=2024-ageing-report-country-fiche-Croatia.pdf.
[5] EIGE (2024), “Gender Equality Index 2024: Croatia”, European Institute for Gender Equality, https://eige.europa.eu/gender-equality-index/2024/country/HR.
[18] EIGE (2021), “Measuring femicide in Croatia”, European Institute for Gender Equality, https://eige.europa.eu/publications-resources/publications/measuring-femicide-croatia.
[6] Eurofound (2022), “Working conditions in the time of COVID-19: Implications for the future”, European Working Conditions Telephone Survey 2021 series, https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/system/files/2023-01/ef22012en.pdf.
[12] European Commission (2024), “Special Eurobarometer 545: Gender Stereotypes”, https://europa.eu/eurobarometer/surveys/detail/2974.
[23] European Commission (2024), “The 2024 Ageing Report: Economic & Budgetary Projections for the EU Member States (2022-2070)”, European Economy Institutional Paper 279, https://economy-finance.ec.europa.eu/document/download/971dd209-41c2-425d-94f8-e3c3c3459af9_en?filename=ip279_en.pdf.
[20] European Commission (2024), The 2024 Pension Adequacy Report: Current and future income adequacy in old age in the EU - Vol. II, https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2767/550848.
[26] European Commission (2024), The 2024 Pension Adequacy Report: Current and future income adequacy in old age in the EU; Vol. 1, https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2767/909323.
[9] European Commission (2021), “2021 Long-term care report: Trends, challenges and opportunities in an ageing society; Vol. II, country profiles”, https://ec.europa.eu/social/BlobServlet?docId=24080&langId=en.
[14] European Commission (2018), Flash Eurobarometer 470: Work-Life Balance, https://europa.eu/eurobarometer/surveys/detail/2185.
[21] Eurostat (2025), “Aggregate replacement ratio”, https://doi.org/10.2908/TESPM100.
[16] Eurostat (2025), “Ever-partnered women who have experienced violence by an intimate partner, by type of violence”, https://doi.org/10.2908/GBV_IPV_TYPE.
[17] Eurostat (2025), “Ever-working women who have experienced sexual harassment at work, by occurrence of the last episode”, https://doi.org/10.2908/GBV_SHW_OCC.
[25] Eurostat (2025), Gender based violence against women (gbv) - Reference Metadata in Single Integrated Metadata Structure (SIMS), https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/en/gbv_sims.htm.
[11] Eurostat (2025), “Inactive population not seeking employment by sex, age and main reason”, https://doi.org/10.2908/LFSA_IGAR.
[3] Immervoll, H. et al. (2022), Activity-related eligibility conditions for receiving unemployment benefits - Results 2022, https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/benefits-and-wages/Activity-related%20eligibility%20conditions%202022.pdf.
[4] Morrica, V. et al. (2019), “Investing in Opportunities for All: Croatia Country Gender Assessment”, World Bank Group, Washington, D.C., https://documents.worldbank.org/en/publication/documents-reports/documentdetail/237711560532005820/investing-in-opportunities-for-all-croatia-country-gender-assessment.
[7] OECD (2025), Education and Skills in Croatia, Reviews of National Policies for Education, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/bace00c4-en.
[1] OECD (2025), OECD Income Distribution Database (IDD), https://www.oecd.org/en/data/datasets/income-and-wealth-distribution-database.html.
[19] OECD (2025), Pensions at a Glance 2025: OECD and G20 Indicators, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/e40274c1-en.
[10] OECD (2023), Improving Long-Term Care in Croatia, OECD Health Policy Studies, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/9de55222-en.
[22] OECD (2023), Pensions at a Glance 2023: OECD and G20 Indicators, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/678055dd-en.
[13] OECD (2022), OECD Family Database - PF2.1: Key characteristics of parental leave systems, http://www.oecd.org/els/soc/PF2_1_Parental_leave_systems.pdf.
[2] OECD (2018), Social Benefit Recipients (SOCR) annual data by country - Pseudo-coverage rates of unemployment benefits, https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/SOCR_UBPseudoCoverageRates.xlsx.
[8] OECD (forthcoming), OECD Reviews of Health Systems: Croatia 2025.
← 1. Workers must have been employed for at least nine out of the 24 months previous months to quality for unemployment benefits after job loss. The maximum benefit duration is 90 days (i.e. approx. three months) for jobseekers with an employment record of up to two years, and then rises by 30 days for each previous year in employment, up to a maximum duration of 450 days (i.e. approximately 15 months) for those with a previous employment record of 25 years or longer. For jobseekers with an employment record of at least 32 years and at most five years remaining before reaching the statutory retirement age, the maximum benefit duration is unlimited.
← 2. Those calculations only account for the rent component of the housing cost allowance and do not consider payments for the costs of utilities and heating.
← 3. The optional component of maternity leave can be combined with part-time work at half of the regular working hours, in which case paid leave entitlements are extended up until the child reaches the age of nine months.
← 4. For the parents of twins and those with three or more children parental leave is extended to 28+2 months, with the payment rate dropping to a little above EUR 550 per months after the sixth month of leave.
← 5. The project duration was gradually shortened under the different implementation phases of the programme, from initially 30 months (with the employment of women lasting up to 24 months) in Phase I, launched in 2017, to 12 to 18 months (with employment of up to 12 months) in Phase II, launched in 2020, to now up to 8 months (employment up to 6 months) in Phase III, launched in 2022. Women can participate in training at any stage during the project implementation, but only in project phases I and II this training could be funded as part of the programme.
← 6. Under the new design, Make a Wish finances the provision of support services for everyday life to persons over 65 years of age and adults with disabilities (as a new target group) to strengthen long-term care and prevent institutionalisation.
← 7. A new National Plan for Protection from Violence against Women and Domestic Violence up to 2029 has been finalised and is due to be adopted before the end of 2025.
← 8. Eurostat highlights that these “survey data might only be a close proxy to real prevalence as survey data depends on the willingness of the respondent to disclose any violence experienced”, pointing to the need to “take into account the extent to which violence is tolerated in the wider community” (Eurostat, 2025[25]).
← 9. This section draws heavily on earlier descriptions and analysis of the Croatian pension system provided in the European Commission’s 2024 Pension Adequacy Report (European Commission, 2024[26]; 2024[20]), its 2024 Ageing Report 2024 (European Commission, 2024[23]) and the complementary Croatian Country Fiche on public pensions (Croatian Pension Insurance Institute, 2023[24]), as well as the Croatian country profile of OECD Pensions at a Glance (OECD, 2025[19]).
← 10. The option of retiring without penalty before the normal retirement age also exists for jobseekers who reach the early retirement age and who have been unemployed for at least two years following the bankruptcy of their employer. However, the number of such cases is very low.
← 11. The figures in this paragraph are based on EU-SILC data, which implies that the statistics for 2024 refer to 2023 incomes.