EU countries spent a combined 153 billion euros on recreation, culture and religion in 2015, which is equivalent to 1% of the bloc’s GDP.

This figure falls significantly short of the EU’s spending on social care (19.2% of GDP in 2015), health care (7.2%), education (4.9%) and defence (1.4%) but is higher than what is spent on environmental protection (0.8%) and housing (0.6%).

Estonia is the bloc’s second largest per GDP spender on recreation, culture and religion with 2% of GDP, followed by Denmark, Bulgaria and Latvia, Eurostat said. The lowest spenders are Britain, Greece and Italy with 0.7% of GDP each and Ireland with 0.6%.

In terms of per capita spending, Luxembourg is ranked first with 1,068 euros spent on recreation and culture per inhabitant followed by Denmark (843 euros), Finland (565 euros), the Netherlands (561 euros) and Sweden (499 euros).

The lowest spenders are Greece with 113 euros per inhabitant, Bulgaria (106 euros) and Romania (97 euros).

Per capita spending in Hungary was 240 euros in 2015 compared with the EU average of 299 euros per inhabitant.

Republished with permission of Hungary Matters, MTI’s daily newsletter.