This international comparison of Public Spending by Function, shows that the sum of Total Public Spending and Retir 2, takes a value close to 50% in Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States, and a higher value (close to 60%) in France. The lower values of UK and USA in Total Public Spending it is due to that the retirement pensions have two levels (retir.1 (publica) and retir.2 (private). Total Public Spending plus Retir 2 is very similar in 4 of these 5 countries, around 50%, but in France seems to be too high. The cause of the high % of France is not due to Retirement, nor to Education, Health, and Defense but to "other public xpending".
Analyzing Public Spending by Function, as % of GDP, we find:
Education: The percentage of Public Education is around 4.5% in Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom, 5.38% in France and 6.11% in the United States
Health: Around 9.2% in France, UK and USA, around 10% in Germany and 6% in Spain.
Retirement: Retir 1 includes % of Public Spending on Retirement. Ret 2 includes % of Private Spending on Retirement in countries where Private Retirement has an important share in total income from retirement (around 50% in the UK and around 33% in the United States, accordingly to provisional estimations).
Pensions (public and private): The sum of Retir.1 and Retir.2 is close to 12% in France, Germany and Spain, around 15$ in the United Kingdom and around 17% in the United States.
Other Public Services: 12,8% in the USA, 18% in UK, 22% in Germnay, 25% and 30% in France.
The OECD Publication Government Spending at a Glance includes more data, although with very small letter size that are very difficult for reading. We expect to include more information in a next update of this Entry.
A telephon version, of the Website sidebar:
