Public expenditure on education, year-on-year real change 2013-2014 (%)

Finally, effective education requires adequate investment. For the first time in the past three years, public expenditure on education increased in 2014, by over 1 % in real terms. As shown in figure 6, about two thirds of EU countries raised spending, and the increase was greater than 5 % in five of them (Bulgaria, Hungary, Latvia, Romania and Slovakia). More than ever, the challenge of financing education lies in investing both sufficiently and effectively.