As has become habitual, the Balearics will next year receive a below average amount under the regional financing distribution system.
The average for the regions will equate to 2,596.34 euros per inhabitant. In the Balearics, this will be 2,522.65 euros. The total will be 2,899.69 million euros.
There are four regions where the per capita financing is lower than the Balearics - Andalusia, Madrid, Murcia and Valencia. In each of these cases, however, the total is higher - Andalusia's 20,835.73 million is the second highest of all behind Catalonia.
The highest amount per capita will be 3,296.45 euros for Cantabria. A majority of regions are above the national average per inhabitant - Aragon, Asturias, Castile and Leon, Castile-La Mancha, Catalonia, Extremadura, Galicia, La Rioja. (The Basque Country and Navarre are excluded from the regional financing system because of their separate and historical arrangements.)
Although the Balearics does not receive the least per inhabitant, it is one of two regions - Madrid is the other - which is most affected by the system. The Balearics and Madrid are net contributors based on their population size, and so while they head the list in terms of contributions by population, they are eleventh and thirteenth when it comes to receiving financing. This discrepancy has long been a complaint of Balearic governments.
Across the political spectrum in the Balearics there is agreement that reform of the financing system should address this imbalance. The current arrangements were meant to have expired in 2014, but neither the Rajoy Partido Popular nor Sánchez PSOE governments have dared to table amendments because of fears of political division.
There are regions which currently have different political complexions to the Balearics that agree with Balearic proposals for reform - Madrid and Murcia, for example. But then are those which are politically similar to the Balearics but disagree, such as Aragon and Asturias.