There is the poverty and the social exclusion problem in the centre of interest of the social policy and research in the EU countries and beyond. New social risks associated with the labor markets unstable development, the family institution conversion and destabilization, the growing migration, as well as with the social state role restriction, led to the poverty and the social exclusion levels deepening in the EU economically developed market countries, too. In the strategic document Europe 2020 one of the targets is oriented to poverty and social exclusion. The aim is decreasing the number of people living in the risk of poverty or social exclusion about 20 000 000. The Slovak Republic is obligated to reduce the number of people living in the risk of poverty or social exclusion by 170 000. According statistical finding EU SILC 2011 the poverty rate increased about 1 percentage point (13 %) compared previous survey. The paper deals with the poverty and the social exclusion phenomenon in the Slovak Republic and measuring approaches to these categories. The statistical finding EU SILC is the harmonic detection main tool in the field of the poverty and the social exclusion in the EU. The author mentions the importance of the national indicators, what reflect the country specificities after the realized analysis of the social indicators of the poverty and the social exclusion. Besides the poverty main income indicators should be received further indicators, what allow to take into account the multidimension of the poverty and the social exclusion problem. In the paper there are suggested the ideas for the poverty and the social exclusion reduction. The solution is in macroeconimic development, in the citizen activation, the education, as well as in the enterprises and individuals social responsibility.
