Strong economic impact of multinational groups

In 2022, independent enterprises accounted for an average of 95.2% of all active enterprises across the 14 countries participating in the exercise (Belgium, Denmark, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, Finland, Sweden and Norway). The remaining 4.8% of enterprises belonged to an all-resident (domestic) enterprise group or a multinational enterprise group (domestically or foreign controlled). These ‘dependent’ enterprises employed on average 47.4% of all people employed in the respective countries.

Source dataset: Eurostat calculations based on Eurogroups Register and SBS data

In addition, dependent enterprises contributed more than 67.6% of wages and salaries and 74.0% of the net turnover. They created 68.1% of the total value added and 69.0% of the gross operating surplus. This pattern, which highlights the economic importance of enterprises belonging to an all-resident or a multinational enterprise group, is observed in all participating countries.

Focusing on the enterprises that belong to an MNE group, even though they represented only 1.2% of all enterprises in the 14 countries, they accounted for 31.3% of the total employment, 49.1% of the total wages and salaries, 58.5% of the net turnover, 52.5% of the value added and 56.4% of the gross operating surplus.