The Government’s total expenditure for 2018 amounted to $254.8 billion in 2018 and, according to the Finance Ministry’s End of Year Outcome Statement 2018, this is $6.2 billion less than what the administration projected to spend.
According to the report, the total non-interest recurrent expenditure amounted to $191.2 billion in 2018, some $2.3 billion less than the initial forecast, due to lower-than-projected spending on transfer payments and other goods and services.
Furthermore, transfer payments to public enterprises and agencies totaled $80.4 billion in 2018, representing a decrease of $1.5 billion or 1.8 percent, when compared with the estimate in Budget 2019. The Finance Ministry said that this resulted from under-spending by the local subvention agencies, which spent $41.6 billion, compared to the projection of $42.7 billion.
The Ministry said that other contributors to the decline in transfer payments include pensions, which was $800 million lower than the projected $22.8 billion in Budget 2019. Other goods and services totaled $51.3 billion for 2018, reflecting a $1.3 billion or 2.5 percent lower than projected in Budget 2019.
As for employment costs, the Finance Ministry said that this totaled $59.5 billion, in 2018, an increase of $100 million or 0.9 percent over projected expenditure. It said that this increase was driven by increased wages and salaries granted in 2018.
