Nîmes has more poor people than Bordeaux, Pissevin 4th poorest district in France: the edifying report from the Observatory of Inequalities

Pissevin-Valdegour, quatrième quartier le plus pauvre de France. Midi Libre – MiKAEL ANISSET

L’Observatoire des inégalités sur la pauvreté en France a publié son rapport 2024-2025. Sans surprise, le Gard figure en septième position des départements les plus pauvres.

The report on poverty in France 2024-2025, published on December 3, offers an in-depth analysis of the state of poverty in France, based on age, social category… or place of residence.

Unsurprisingly, our territory stands out by being at the top of a number of rankings. Thus, Gard is in seventh position among the departments with the highest poverty rate. It stands at 20% of the population (1). Ahead of him are Réunion, Seine-Saint-Denis, Martinique, the Pyrénées-Orientales, Aude and Haute-Corse.

A very high number of people in poverty in Nîmes

On the scale of cities with more than 20,000 inhabitants, there are no Gard municipalities among the 20 municipalities with the highest poverty rate (one municipality from Occitanie is there, Béziers, with 36%). On the other hand, in the ranking of the 20 municipalities with the highest number of poor people, Nîmes is in 11th position. An abnormally high place, since Nîmes is “only” the 21st most populated city in France. There are 43,238 people living below the poverty line in Nîmes (for 148,000 inhabitants). In comparison, Paris and its 2 million inhabitants have 313,350.

Nîmes even has more people in poverty than… Bordeaux (38,568), the 9th largest municipality in France.

Finally, in its report, the Observatory of Inequality also gives a table of the city's priority neighborhoods that are the poorest in France. The Pissevin-Valdegour neighborhood is in fourth place, with a poverty rate of 72%: 11,880 people below the poverty line out of a population of 16,500. With one particularity: young people represent half of the neighborhood's population. Precariousness therefore affects more young people here than elsewhere. In this ranking, the Chemin-Bas d’Avignon-Clos d’Orville district is in 12th position, with a poverty rate of 66%.

(1) The poverty threshold is taken into account, which is 60% of the median income, or 1064 for a single person after social benefits.