Ukrainians make a significant contribution to Latvia’s budget, data suggest / Article

In fact, as a group, Ukrainians give more to the treasury than they receive from it, LSM+ concluded after comparing data from the relevant government agencies.

For the full year 2024, the state budget allocated 70 million euros for the support of Ukrainian refugees, and the Interior Ministry assumed that the amount might have to be increased within a year. However, the opposite appears to have happened.

As of December 12, only 55.86 million of this money had actually been distributed, according to calculations from the Ministry of Finance, forwarded to LSM+ by the press service of the Interior Ministry.

Meanwhile, it is estimated that in the first 10 months of the year, Ukrainians employed in Latvia should have contributed 53.5 million euros to the state budget in the form of taxes on their salaries – though the State Revenue Service (VID) cannot yet confirm that is the amount that has been paid in. 

At the request of LSM+, the State Revenue Service (VID) calculated the amounts. The agency’s representative Evita Teice-Mamaja explained to LSM+ that this refers to amounts calculated based on reports submitted to the SRS by Latvian employers. The actual transfer of these taxes to the budget is the responsibility and obligation of the employer, not the employee (this, of course, applies not only to Ukrainians, but to all hired workers).

The State Revenue Service told LSM+ that at the beginning of December, almost 10 thousand refugees were employed in Latvia.

On average, in 2024, LSM+ calculated that taxes on the salaries of all Ukrainian refugees working in Latvia amounted to just over 5 million euros per month. This means that their total contribution actually exceeded the budget expenditures on support programs for the same period in November. In effect, Latvia’s Ukrainian revenue/expenditure balance will have been “in the black” by December.

Of course, this only takes into account domestic spending in support of Ukrainians, not the value of military and humanitarian aid sent to Ukraine itself.

But nor is Ukrainians’ contribution to the Latvian budget limited to salary taxes. Like all other residents of the country, Ukrainians are also consumers of goods and services. 

For every euro spent at the checkout of a Latvian store, about 18 cents will go to the state treasury in the form of Value Added Tax.

Taking all of the above into account, it seems likely that Ukrainian refugees in Latvia make a net contribution of several million euros to Latvian coffers, in addition to their payroll taxes. LSM+ estimates that payroll taxes total around 5 million euros per month with VAT adding several more millions to the total.

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