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Romania is ranked last in the European Union when it comes to amounts annually spent on family benefits, 104 euros per capita in 2017, as against an EU of 675 euros, according to data released on Monday by Eurostat.
The annual family benefits expenditure per inhabitant was also highest in Luxembourg (3,100 euros per inhabitant), followed by Denmark (1,700), Sweden (1,400), Germany (1,300) and Finland (1,200). In 2017, three countries had family benefits expenditure below 200 euros per inhabitant: Romania (100), Bulgaria (130) and Lithuania (180).
However, if we take into account the share of expenditures on family benefits in the total social benefits, Romania is ahead of countries such as France, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands.
In 2017, the 27 EU member states spent 301 billion euros altogether on family benefits (2.3% of EU GDP). This represented 8.6% of the total spent on social protection benefits.
According to this indicator, Romania is close to the EU average, with a share of expenditures on family benefits in total social benefits standing at 7.69%, versus 7.59% in France, 7.57% in Belgium, 6.33% in Italy, 5.39% in Spain, 4.9% in Portugal and 4.2% in the Netherlands.
