In this study we provide some preliminary evidence about the impact of the economic crisis on household living standards, measured by real consumption expenditures per capita, and the distribution of living standards across households, measured by indices of inequality. Our study has two distinguishing characteristics worth highlighting right from the start. The first is that it is based on a set of households that were first surveyed in May 1997 just before the onset of the crisis, and then fourteen months later in Agustus 1998 when the crisis had reached its peak. Examining the impact of the crisis using a 'panel' of households offers the opportunity to identify how the welfare of specific households changed as a result of the crisis.