Eurostat published data on Monday revealing that Finland had the highest level of indebtedness in public finances among all European Union member states last year. At the end of the year, Finland’s public debt was 210.5 billion euros, which equated to 75.8 percent of its gross domestic product. This debt ratio increased by 2.3 percentage points from the previous year, making it higher than any other member state.
In response to this issue, the government unveiled a proposal last week to balance public finances next year through spending cuts of approximately 1.4 billion euros and tax reductions of 1.4 billion euros. Public debt refers to the debt owed by public entities to other sectors of the national economy and foreign countries.
While Finland had the highest increase in debt ratios last year, overall debt ratios of EU member states decreased by 1.7 percentage points to 81.7 percent, with euro countries seeing a decrease of 2.3 percentage points to 88.6 percent. Latvia, Romania, Estonia, Luxembourg, and Belgium followed closely behind Finland in terms of increases in debt ratios last year.
Greece, Italy, France, Spain, and Belgium were the most heavily indebted euro countries last year, with Greece having a debt ratio of 161.9 percent and Italy having a debt ratio of 137.3 percent. However, Portugal saw a decrease in its debt ratio last year along with Greece, Belgium, Spain and France despite their high levels of indebtedness compared to other members states like Estonia which had the lowest debt ratio at only 19.6%.
