In 2020, government expenditure reached 98.1 billion euros, corresponding to 48.4% of GDP (+5.9 p.p. compared to 2019). This amount of expenditure was significantly lower than the average for all countries in the Euro area (-5.7 p.p.).
Compared to 2019, government expenditure increased by 7.8% in nominal terms, largely due to economic policy measures taken to alleviate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Social benefits were the most relevant economic item, representing 19.8% of GDP. Compensation of employees and intermediate consumption weighed 11.7% and 5.6%, respectively.
Using the classification of functions of government, in 2019, the last year for which this information is available, the structure of government primary expenditure was already focused on the social protection function (42.7%), followed by the health function and the education function (16.6% and 11.1%, respectively).