Act II · The stateStory 15 of 31
What €100 buys
Of every €100 the Cyprus state spent in 2024, €24 went on pensions and €16 on health. In 2005 health took €7.
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Thirteen billion euro is a number nobody can picture. A hundred euro is a number everybody can. So take everything the state spent in 2024 and shrink it to one €100 note.
Spending by purpose per €100, with the same amount per resident for the year. The state spent €13,657 per resident, or €37 a day.
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Eurostat gov_10a_exp, general government expenditure by function, 2024; population: Eurostat, annual average. Pensions are old-age and survivors' pensions. Running the state is general public services without debt interest.
What the numbers say
Almost a quarter of the note, €24, goes on pensions. Health takes €16 and education €13. Those three together are more than half of everything.
Running the state itself, meaning Parliament, the ministries, the tax office and the embassies, takes a little over €10. Family, disability and unemployment benefits take €9. Roads, farming and support for the economy take €7.
Then come the things people often assume are much larger. Defence is under €5. Police, courts and the fire service are €4. Interest on the public debt is €3.
The same note looked different in 2005.
Spending by purpose per €100 of all public spending, 2024 against 2005.
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Eurostat gov_10a_exp, general government expenditure by function, 2005 and 2024. Shares of the total, so they are not affected by prices.
Health has more than doubled its share, from €7 to €16, and interest on the debt has more than halved, from €8 to €3. Pensions have risen from €17 to €24, and family and other benefits have fallen from €14 to €9.
What it means for you
Divide the spending by everyone who lives here and the state spent €13,657 per resident in 2024. That is €3,225 on pensions, €2,182 on health and €1,798 on education for each person, whether or not they are a pensioner, a patient or a pupil.
The jump in health is not what it first seems. Before 2019 a large part of what people spent on doctors and medicines came out of their own pocket or from private insurance, and that spending never passed through the state. GESY brought it inside. You now pay for it as a contribution on your payslip, and the state's accounts show it as public spending. Part of the rise is money that was always being spent on health and has moved from a private bill to a public one.
What people argue
Is the state spending too much on pensions? Pensions are the largest line. One view is that this is simply what an ageing country looks like, and that Cyprus still spends less of its income on pensions than Europe does. Another is that the bill will keep growing faster than the contributions that pay for it. The pension reform put out for consultation in September 2026 is an argument about exactly this line.
Which side convinces you?
Is the state spending too much on pensions?
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Has health spending really doubled? In the state's accounts, yes. For the country as a whole, much less so, because of the move from private to public payment. Anyone comparing health budgets before and after 2019 is comparing two different systems.
How we know
The split comes from Eurostat's breakdown of government spending by purpose, which every EU country reports in the same way. We group it into eleven lines; the Method page lists what is in each.
The chart shows shares of the total, not amounts. Total spending more than doubled between 2005 and 2024, from €6.2 billion to €13.3 billion, and part of that is rising prices. Shares are not affected by prices, which is why the comparison uses them.