Social benefits: Which EU countries spend the most?

euronews (in English)

Social benefits: Which EU countries spend the most?  With pensions, social housing, unemployment benefits, medical care, and disability support, Europe has among the best social protections in the world. But which EU countries are the most generous when it comes to public spending?  READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/11/17/social-benefits-which-eu-countries-spend-the-most  Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages

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00:00Which EU country spends the most on welfare and social benefits?

00:10EU countries pour roughly 27% of their GDP into welfare and social benefits.

00:17That means that more than a quarter of their output goes to things like pensions,

00:22social housing, unemployment benefits, medical care and disability support.

00:27Finland, France and Austria are the most generous EU members,

00:31each spending an estimated 32% of their GDP on social benefits.

00:37At the other hand, Ireland sits last with only 12%,

00:41less than non-EU member states like Bosnia-Herzegovina and Serbia, according to Eurostat.

00:48Next to the bottom are Malta and Hungary.

00:51The silver lining is that some of the countries at the bottom are catching up.

00:55Estonia boosted its welfare spending by almost 20% last year,

01:00Croatia by nearly 18% and Romania by 17.5%.

01:06At the same time, the slowest increases were seen in Greece, Sweden, Italy and Denmark.

01:12So how is welfare money distributed?

01:15Pensions take the biggest chunk, 2 trillion euros.

01:19Sickness and healthcare is second with nearly 1.5 trillion euros,

01:24followed by family and child support measures with 0.4 trillion euros.

01:29Instead of creating a yap

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