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  1. Education6 countries

    Switzerland and Italy: 19% and 65% of adults read no book in a year; adult literacy scores 266 and 246

    Switzerland · no books 19%266Denmark · no books 28%280Norway · no books 29%283Croatia · no books 58%254Portugal · no books 58%235Italy · no books 65%246Adults' mean literacy score, 2023

    Across 20 European countries: where more people read no books, adult literacy is lower (rank correlation −0.84). It holds after accounting for income per head (−0.71).

    Source: Eurostat: EU-SILC 2022 (book reading); OECD: Survey of Adult Skills 2023Open on the chart →
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    In 2022 Eurostat asked people aged 16+ how many books they had read in a year. In 2023 an OECD test measured how well adults aged 16–65 understand texts. Countries with more non-readers of books tend to rank lower in literacy.

    Each bar: the mean literacy score of adults aged 16–65 in 2023; beside the name, the share of people aged 16+ who read no book in a year, 2022. The three countries with the lowest share and the three with the highest.

    Eurostat, EU-SILC 2022 culture module: «read no book in the last 12 months». OECD Survey of Adult Skills 2023: mean literacy score. Spearman rank correlation across 20 countries; the partial one accounts for GDP per head at purchasing power parity, 2022.

    This compares country levels, not change: the link does not say books make people literate or that literate people read more. The surveys cover different ages (16+ and 16–65). The fall in literacy since 2012 is not linked to book reading across countries.

    A question for this picture

    Where did adults' literacy fall since 2012?

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