Gyeonggi Province has submitted a record 42.1946 trillion won budget proposal for 2027, increasing planned spending by 2.1369 trillion won, or 5.3 percent, from the previous year’s 40.0577 trillion won budget. The expansion largely reflects growth in projects supported by the national government rather than a comparable rise in money the province can allocate freely.
Resources available for discretionary use are projected to fall by about 59 percent, from 4.0595 trillion won to 1.65 trillion won. To address the shortfall, the province plans to issue 246.2 billion won in new local government bonds and draw an additional 510 billion won from two funds, including 410 billion won from the Integrated Fiscal Stabilization Fund and 100 billion won from the Regional Development Fund.
The new borrowing would bring Gyeonggi’s cumulative local bond issuance over the past three years to 1.9072 trillion won. Together with fund transfers and other resources, the province says it has assembled 3.0494 trillion won that can be used within the budget, even as its underlying fiscal flexibility has narrowed sharply.
Resident programs remain funded despite tighter resources
The proposal maintains funding for several resident-facing programs. It allocates 244.5 billion won for school meals, 57.7 billion won for the Youth Basic Income program, 55.4 billion won for maternal and newborn health services, and 41.6 billion won to improve conditions for childcare center employees. It also includes 436.1 billion won for the public management system for city buses, 61.6 billion won for local currency support and 37.5 billion won for opportunity income payments to farmers and fishers.
Gyeonggi also withdrew a plan to reduce provincial subsidy rates for joint projects with cities and counties to around 30 percent. Most subsidy rates will instead remain at their existing levels of roughly 50 to 70 percent, limiting the additional burden that would otherwise have shifted to municipal governments.
The financing plan does not close every gap. Fiscal constraints left some legally required expenditures and three months of public employee salaries outside the main budget proposal. The province plans to pursue spending adjustments and additional revenue, while the provincial council’s review will determine how the borrowing, fund use and omitted costs are handled in the final budget.