Municipalities see €33b cost rise in 2019

The net costs of municipalities’ operational economy grew to EUR 32.8 billion in 2019, according to the Statistics Finland.

Especially, the net costs of social and healthcare activities and education and cultural activities grew. The net costs recorded in social and healthcare activities grew by 5.1 per cent year on year to EUR 19.2 billion.

The net costs of education and cultural activities, in turn, grew by 4.0 per cent to EUR 11.5 billion.

The data for the compilation of Statistics Finland’s statistics on local government finances were collected from all 311 municipalities and 139 joint municipal authorities in Finland.

In 2019, the total costs of municipalities’ operational economy amounted to EUR 45.4 billion, and they grew by 2.5 per cent from that in the previous year.

The income of municipalities’ operational economy totalled EUR 12.5 billion, decreasing by 2.1 per cent from the previous year’s level. Thus, the net costs of the operational economy were EUR 32.8 billion. The net costs of all task entities were higher than in the previous year. Net costs increased by 4.4 per cent in total from the previous statistical reference year.

As in the previous years, municipalities recorded the majority of net costs of the operational economy in social and healthcare activities and thus 58.6 per cent of the net costs of municipalities’ entire operational economy were directed at this.

In 2019, a total of EUR 19.2 billion in net costs was directed to social and healthcare activities, which was 5.1 per cent more than one year earlier.

The share of specialised healthcare was the highest relative to the net costs of all social and healthcare activities, while primary healthcare formed the second largest share. In total, EUR 7.2 billion on net was used for specialised healthcare and EUR 3.4 billion for primary healthcare services.

The second largest share of the net costs of the entire operational economy, or EUR 11.5 billion, was recorded in education and cultural activities.

This share of the operational economy was 34.9 per cent. The total net costs of education and cultural activities were 4.0 per cent higher compared to that of one year ago. In the task entity of education and cultural activities, the highest net costs were recorded in primary education and the second largest in early childhood education. In 2019, EUR 5.3 billion was directed to primary education on net, and, correspondingly, EUR 3.0 billion to early childhood education.

A total of EUR 2.1 billion, corresponding to a share of 6.5 per cent of net costs of municipalities’ entire operational economy, was directed at other activities, which include all other activities apart from social and healthcare, education, and cultural activities. In examination of the statistics on local government finances, the costs of other activities increased by 0.4 per cent from the previous statistical reference year’s level.