Last year, Germany paid significantly more into the European Union budget than it spent from it, claims the German Economic Institute, which analyzed data from the European Commission.
In 2023, Germany paid about 17.4 billion euros more into the EU budget than it received, making it the largest net payer. The year before, it gave 19.7 billion euros.
In second place is France, which last year paid almost nine billion euros more than it withdrew from the EU budget. In third place is Italy with a net contribution of around 4.5 billion euros.
The largest net recipient in 2023 – as in the previous year – was Poland with 8.2 billion euros. Behind it are Romania with six billion euros and Hungary with 4.6 billion euros.
Looking at net payments per capita, the estimate shows that Ireland ranks first with €236. In Germany, payments amounted to 206 euros per inhabitant.
The budget of the Union in 2023 was 173.1 billion euros. Of that, 143.4 billion euros went to member countries.
In addition, there were funds from the European Pandemic Recovery Fund of 66.1 billion euros, of which the members used 64.6 billion euros.
As the largest net financier of the Union, Germany provides almost a quarter of the funds. At the same time, the German government emphasizes that Germany also benefits more from the EU internal market than any other member state, reports SEEbiz.