In total, Luxembourgish households spend an average of 24.5% on housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels, which is barely above the European average for the same category (24.2%). However, this category excludes purchasing homes, which is certainly quite a high expense in the Grand Duchy.
After housing costs, transport accounts for the second-highest proportion of spending, at 14.4%. This number is likely to change slightly in the near future, once the government introduces free public transport in 2020. The change may be minimal as transport services only make up 0.7% of the category. Following closely behind transport at 14.3% is the category 'other goods and services', which includes insurance and social protection.
Food and non-alcoholic beverages make up 8.9% of households budgets in Luxembourg, with alcohol and tobacco products following closely at 8.3%.
The next categories all fall under 8% of household budgets, namely spending on restaurants and hotels (7.2%), recreation and culture (5.9%), furnishings and household equipment (5.5%), and clothing (5.2%).
The categories Luxembourgers spend the least amount of their budgets on are health (3.3%), communications (1.4%), and education (1.1%).
A comparison with the European Union average shows that the EU budget dedicated to housing is at a similar level to the Luxembourgish one, with transport costs accounting for similar amounts of household budgets as well (13%).
However, Luxembourgers spend less on food and non-alcoholic drinks than the European average, which is placed at 12%. The EU average spending on restaurants and hotels and recreation and culture are also higher than Luxembourgish spending on these categories, at around 9% per category.
Globally, Eurostat concluded that most member states households spend the most on housing, with the exception of Estonia, Lithuania, and Romania. In these countries, households spend more on food, whereas in Cyprus and Malta, the restaurant and hotels category came out on top.
We've embedded Eurostat's widget below, but unfortunately you can't see the breakdown of each category due to the width of the widget. Alternatively, you can view the widget on Eurostat's website.
