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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