PUBLIC EXPENDITURE ON EDUCATION IN EU COUNTRIES VS. ECONOMIC GROWTH

Abstract

Education is one of the most important tasks of the state. According to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (EU), education remains the exclusive competence of member states. There is organizational diversity in the education process in the various EU countries, as well as a different scale of its public financing. The purpose of this article is to confirm the thesis that the degree of public spending on education translates into state economic growth. The article presents the results of a study of the extent of public spending of the European Union member states on education covering primary, secondary and higher education in 1996-2022. The results obtained were compared with economic indicators of individual EU countries. An attempt was also made to distinguish groups of countries based on the criterion of the level of spending on education in relation to their total public spending and based on the criterion of the amount of GDP growth in 1996-2022.