General Budget of the European Union

In the system of public finances on the union level the central place is taken up by the general budget of the European Union. The amount of assets that are accumulated on it and then transferred to different entities of the Union's economic life define its relevance and importance for the governments of all the member states of the EU. One cannot be surprised by the fact that the budget of the European Union is a regular subject of a sharp political fight of the individual states, members of the EU. The matter connected with the amount of payments made to the Union's treasury by individual EU states creates particular kind of controversies. No state will agree to be a net payer of the Community for a longer period of time. What is more we start to observe a decline in the level of enthusiasm connected with admitting new countries to the group of EU member states. It is caused by the fact that enlarging the Union by new member states carries with it the necessity of spending a great amount of assets from the EU budget for financial support and development of economy of new member states which state and technological level is far even from the union's average. This situation makes the subject of the general budget of the European Union become a more and more discussed category of Union's state finances. In such a context then taking further steps and actions to reconstruct the budget and redefine some of its categories becomes essential. It is in no way an easy task, but necessary to carry out, because of ongoing unification processes in Europe as well as in the world. The present article is an attempt to present the whole structure of the EU budget as well as highlighting those of its elements that are the subject of most controversy.