Think of it as an investment. The rest of the EU also benefits from their hard work, and economic prosperity. Other countries in the EU have also enjoyed economic growth and support over the years.

I'm old enough to remember internal borders with passport checks in Europe, before the wall fell and Poland was still on the other side of that. Nice to see them moving on from that.

Thanks to the EU free movement of people, I've now studied, worked and lived in four different countries. I know people all over Europe. I currently live in Germany. Germany benefits a lot from the EU. Yes it costs money. But there's trade, access to skilled labour, etc. as well. And if you look at Poland, it's what sits between Germany and Belarus & Ukraine. So, there's a strategic relevance as well. Poland doing fine is good for everyone else in the EU.

Yes, this is how European social welfare works. And it is fantastic! Because the entirety of the EU is benefitting from it. Polish people have larger spending power, interesting and safe places to visit, etc.

This is not a "present" given to Poland. This is ensuring a better life for all Europeans.

They're also the 3rd smallest net recipient of EU funds per capita:

https://i.imgur.com/VlRkDMy.png

You greatly overestimate its significance. The benefits are roughly 1% of the GDP. In 2023 Poland netted 8.2 bn€ [1]. The GDP was 751 bn€.

[1] https://www.pap.pl/en/news/poland-largest-recipient-eu-funds...

> I love the polish, but credit where credit is due

> I ment: „Poland gets money, Poland transforms it into more money”.

I have noticed that absolutely every time Poland's success is mentioned, someone from EU steps in to downplay it. A self-serving bias. Seriously, that type of comment is absolutely everywhere. Any YouTube video. Any Reddit post. In last couple days I have seen it about dozen times, last time today here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ArchitecturalRevival/comments/1t6k7...

And each time it's some unsubstantiated remark, not once do those people actually bother to check what the actual amount of subsidies did Poland receive over the past 22 years, or how does Poland fare against other EU members. They always imply that ALL THIS SUCCESS is thanks to EU.

For the record: Poland received in total about as much as its yearly budget is in 2026. Other recent EU members also received more-less the same or, per-capita, much more! Did you bother to see how other EU countries developed in that time?

Growth-wise, since 1990, Poland's economy grew substantially each year (even before joining the EU in 2004) and is only behind China: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F5Z8u1mWMAAHtUU?format=png&name=...

Seriously, look at that damn map. Find other EU members on that list.

Ergo, Poland must be doing something EXCEPTIONAL if its combined growth FAR SURPASSES not only any other recent EU members but ALL BUT ONE country worldwide? It can't just be that relatively small amount of the EU money, or the EU membership itself, can it?

So, for f*ks say, how about western EU shuts up and acknowledges IT'S NOT ALL THANKS TO THE EU, will it?

I am personally a big fan of the EU, but those downplaying comments are so annoying I can't but think it's some sort of jealousy. Credit where credit is due to POLES themselves.

You could just as well claim the growth is thanks to NATO membership because, if you look at Ukraine and Belaraus, it's quite plausible as well.

The EU is working as intended then.

Even without funds distributing EU cash, a common market works as a leveller this way and pulls up the poorer countries, because if you can live work and operate anywhere, people naturally pick the cheapest and easiest places to start a business serving the EU.

Spain and Portugal were the previous beneficiaries and everyone benefits really as jobs are created everywhere.

This is far better than a situation where larger economies dominate all others forever.

Since you seem to be implying causality here, I would assume that the other major beneficiaries have enjoyed a similar period of growth?

If there was a correlation you would see the same trend in Slovakia, Hungary and such

> „Poland is the largest beneficiary of EU funds 2014-2020, with one in four euro going to Poland“ https://www.gov.pl/web/funds-regional-policy/poland-at-the-f... Update: The comments below this are strange.

The comments are questioning what you wrote, which implies without evidence, that a small amount of EU money relative to Poland's own GDP, in just 6 years, is somehow entirely responsible for Poland's growth.

Not surprised to see "German" quotation marks in this petty complaint...

There are many countries in the EU that get many more funds per person than Poland and have much worse outcomes.

Some moron always show up with the "but it was all the EU subsidies" talking point, which is quite frankly part of racist tropes of eastern Europeans being dumb and worse than westerners. Could you imagine them accomplishing anything on their own? That's ridiculous. It's us, the western saviors, who did this with our penny subsidies!

Many (especially Germans) try to wrap it falsely as charity and throwing numbers without context.

It is not true for the entire EU budget: the 2014–2020 MFF allowed up to €959.99bn in commitments, so Poland’s €77.6bn cohesion allocation was about 8.1% of the whole EU long-term budget.

For context this is like 0.7% of yearly German overall public expenditure go to Poland. And this money per year is also like 5% of state budget spending.

a big share of this money goes back to foreign companies in form of sales and contracts.

Poland had a relatively clear idea of what they wanted to do once the Russians were out unlike some of the other countries in the eastern block, and it didn’t hurt that some of their neighbors to the north Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia also had pretty good idea of what they wanted to do once they were out from under the Russians, it’s just too bad that the Ukraine when they had the brief chance, they didn’t take advantage of it hopefully they’ll get a second chance.

> I ment: „Poland gets money, Poland transforms it into more money”.

It's not trivial that this works. In Hungary we messed this up big time, hopefully it can get fixed now.

And 90 cents of every euro returning to the Old EU. Not to mention tax avoidance schemes, western companies transfer their profits out.

Finland has been an EU net contributor since 2001. Now it has among the highest unemployment rates in the EU and is going through austerity, while Poland is visibly building and converging. I understand the logic of cohesion funds, but from Finland it increasingly feels like: we cut, Poland builds.

This is no charity, this money largerly comes back to the countries that are biggest spenders on these funds. It's basically an equivalent of FDI

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_rising_tide_lifts_all_boats

Since one of the major donors is Germany, I also like to consider this as reparations for WWII. I wish people in Poland would realize more how generous the EU has been to them.

The Baltics and the Balkan states probably get just as many handouts as Poland, and still show lesser rate of economic growth.

In 2023 they got a measly 10% (8.2Billion) of the GM and Chrysler bailout that will never be repaid ($85Billion)

The EU gets huge benefits for that investment, the CEO of GM gets a multi-milion dollar pay packet.

Definitely not the largest per capita though. There's a lot of people in Poland.

Per capita tho it isn't the largest beneficiary. The funds were just well spent.

Oh no, other countries have been in that position but it did not go well

Countries don't mechanically convert inputs into development. There are many examples of countries with large capital inflows and/or strong capabilities that still fail to become strong economies. Corruption is one of the major frictions that prevents those resources from translating into broad economic success.

But be fair: Poland had to rebuild after WWII and 40+ years of communism.

When Western countries got money via the Marshal Plan:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan

Poland had... "friendly" Soviets "supporting" their country for almost 44 years...

This is such a bad take. I'm impressed how often this gets parroted online.

Next time, please check how many Poles left Poland for western EU since they joined.

It’s a factor that’s not any more significant than the Marshall Plan was in your Wirtschaftswunder in the 1970s, which, oddly enough, a lot of Germans have no issue attributing to a domestic merit alone. Funny how that works!

If it was the EU contributions that were the dominant force here, Germany could… simply do the same and prop up its own struggling economy with money printed by the ECB. Instead, it prefers to see it crumble under an obese welfare state that largely funds inactive third-world fake asylum seekers. So clearly, there’s way more nuance to economic success than simply having funds redirected from one account to another.

Well, Germany had their own EU funds when they raided other countries. Today, noone bats an eye?

At least Poland does it legally.

No one can deny EU funds have helped, but putting credits only there is pure misinformation. Take a look at what part of GDP are EU funds and what is the size per capita. Hard work and open market were actually the biggest contributors to the development of Poland.

It seems to be almost universally agreed across the former Soviet Bloc that Poland indeed used the EU funds more wisely than anyone else.

> „Poland is the largest beneficiary of EU funds 2014-2020, with one in four euro going to Poland“

The lion share of this budget has been defrauded, fraud is only slightly less widespread than in Hungary. Piles of (only) documentation are produced by professionals then funds are funnelled to the families of local authorities. Honestly I'm confused, maybe that's indeed how EU funds are suppoused to work?

It's important to understand the difference between handouts and investments with an expected ROI.

It's unfortunate that 0th order thinking jumps to this framing, it's one reason I always laugh when people talk about SpaceX taking 'government handouts' without these folks realizing the 100x ROI the government got out of their investment. All investments are 'hand outs' but not all 'hand outs' are investments.

Clear thinking at a large enough scale will prevent a populace from self destructing due to stupidity about this topic.

Honestly, it’s not why their economy has grown. That money is just wasted on government projects? Has it hurt? No, but it is a small amount when it comes to the entire Polish economy.

it's far from enough given they didn't pay reparation yet for wwii

Government investment works. That's why America's billionaires are mostly just people stealing as much of it as they can.

It's a first line buffer state against Putin.

Think of it as defense spending

Cue the butthurt Germans, decimating their own bread and butter industries by ridiculous policies like diesel and nuclear bans, immigration straight into the welfare state, then complaining that others - who did not commit economic suicide - fare better. Note that Germany vastly profits from the EU as well, as it allows Germany to push e.g. their established supermarkets into Eastern Europe, undercutting any competition. This is never mentioned when talking about "largest beneficiaries of EU funds"

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Well, fuck you. If you take a look at the GDP growth, Poland grew fastest BEFORE joining EU, and also during “populist” government, when much of EU funding was withheld for political reasons.

Polish economy grows despite EU membership, not because of it.

>credit where credit is due

Eh, as an American I've spent many hours reading Europeans railing against the United States here on HN.

Not once has a European ever given the US credit for the Marshall Plan.

I actually look forward to seeing the EU become the global hegemon so they can learn about how much "fun" it is. The US can sit in the stands eating popcorn just like Switzerland.

Now compare that number to this number:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_material_losses_during_...

And don’t forget the Partitions and The Deluge, too.

Crazy how people just like to pretend that wealth acquired before 1950 somehow just appeared there naturally.