Reading Paris's finances: the no-jargon guide
Budget, balance sheet, M57, internal accounting entries — everything you need to read Paris's financial files without being a chartered accountant.
The Paris budget
What the city takes in, what it spends, and what it actually executes.
12,16Md € Total spending · FY 20255 754€ Per Parisian11,34Md € Revenue− 821M € Balance
Budget 2025 voted — administrative accounts will be published in June 2026.See executed 2024 →
Revenue, spending.
Select a row to open its detail (sub-lines, year-over-year change).
Two kinds of spending: operating (day-to-day) and capital investment (what the city builds). New borrowing funds capital only: under the golden rule, it cannot fund recurring spending.
Trend since 2019.
Total budget per year — executed years solid, voted year dashed.
Execution 2025 will be published in June 2026. See 2024 gapsSee 2023 gapsSee 2022 gaps
Further reading
Articles, investigations and profiles connected to the numbers on this page.
Explanation
ExplanationThe municipal golden rule: what article L.1612-4 actually says
A municipality cannot borrow to pay its salaries. This rule, codified in article L.1612-4 of the Code général des collectivités territoriales, is what radically separates a municipal budget from the State's. Anatomy of a short text and its consequences.
ExplanationCan Paris go bankrupt?
Not in the commercial sense — French law forbids a municipality from disappearing. But a very precise prefectoral oversight regime kicks in if the financial golden rules are broken. No town of more than 10,000 residents has been placed under it since 2015. Anatomy of a scenario that has never happened.