Luxembourg Reports Central Government Deficit of €706m in Q3 2023

During a joint session of the finance and budget execution committees of the Chamber of Deputies (parliament) on Friday 1 December 2023, Luxembourg's Minister of Finance, Gilles Roth, presented the state of public finances for the third quarter of 2023.

As of 30 September 2023, total central government revenues amounted to €18.6 billion. Revenues collected by the tax administrations alone amounted to €15.9 billion, which corresponds to an increase of €747 million (+5%) and thus corresponds to 74.7% of the revenue of the voted budget. In October 2023, this represented 83.9% of the voted budget and showed an increase of 8% compared to the same period in 2022.

Total central government expenditure reached €19.3 billion as of 30 September 2023, marking an increase of €2.5 billion or 15%. Luxembourg's Ministry of Finance attributed this increase in public spending to state aid deployed in a "context of crisis" and the impact on spending of successive wage indexations.

The combined revenues and expenditures resulted in a central government deficit of €706 million at the end of the third quarter of 2023. As of 31 October 2023, this deficit had been reduced to €629 million, noted the ministry, due to the slight improvement in tax revenues observed during the month in question.