El gasto de las comunidades autónomas en los llamados servicios no esenciales: algunas reflexiones y propuestas

This paper examines the public expenditure of Spain’s Autonomous Communities on non-essential services, understood as those lying outside the core welfare state functions (healthcare, education, and social services), to assess regional governments’ programmatic autonomy and their capacity to tailor policies to territorial preferences. Using consolidated data from the 2022 Budget Settlement, the study proposes an alternative functional classification that groups such expenditure into five categories: regional public goods, merit-based public services, economic development policies, internal administrative services, and grants to local authorities. The analysis reveals substantial interregional heterogeneity in both budgetary effort and functional composition, linked to differences in competences, fiscal capacities, and policy orientations.The results show that regions with higher effective per capita funding allocate a significantly greater share of their resources to non-essential expenditure, confirming their role as a key area of programmatic autonomy. However, this diversity entails relevant implications for equity, efficiency, and fiscal co-responsibility.