3.000 euros per month for an unaccompanied minor, up to 800 euros for an adult, benefits, housing, food and now even money for the return – The numbers raise questions
For years, the Greek people have been hearing about immigration.
He hears about European funds. For structures. For hospitality programs. For NGOs. For food. For housing. For integration. For returns.
He hears numbers in the millions.
But what the average citizen finds very difficult to understand is something very basic:
How much does it cost each person who enters the country's reception and asylum system, and where exactly does this money go?
And the question becomes even more acute after the statements of the Minister of Immigration and Asylum himself, Thanos Plevris.
The minister stated in February 2026 that an unaccompanied minor costs close to 3.000 euros per month, while for an adult he reported a cost of approximately 700 to 800 euros per month.
Let's stop here.
3.000 euros per month.
That is, approximately 36.000 euros per year for an unaccompanied minor, if the amount mentioned by the minister is used as a basis for calculation.
But a very important clarification is needed:
The 3.000 euros are not given to the minor.
This is not a "3.000 euro allowance".
This is the total cost of the protection system: special accommodation structures, staff, guardianship, psychosocial support, interpretation, protection services and other related costs.
A review of available data has shown that the unit cost of operating Unaccompanied Minors Accommodation Centers alone can reach approximately 76 euros per day for an occupied place, i.e. approximately 2.280–2.356 euros per month, before other protection and guardianship mechanisms are taken into account.
And here begins the columnist's question.
If the child doesn't get 3.000 euros, then who gets paid?
Who pays for the housing costs?
Who is responsible for the feeding?
Who gets paid for the operation of the structures?
How much do security, cleaning, interpretation, psychosocial support, legal assistance and administration services cost?
How much money is directed to public bodies, how much to international organizations, how much to organizations, and how much to private companies through contracts?
This is perhaps the real economic debate surrounding immigration.
Not if a person has 150 or 300 euros in their pocket.
But how much does the entire mechanism that has been created around it cost?
And the money is a lot.
The European Union funds a significant part of the Greek immigration, asylum and border guard system.
For the period 2021–2027, the initial European contribution to the three Greek Home Affairs programmes was approximately:
438,9 million euros from the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund,
€1,1 billion for Border Management and Visa Policy, and €45,6 million from the Internal Security Fund.
But we must say it clearly:
These do not constitute a “reward per immigrant”.
We did not find an official European or Greek mechanism according to which "Greece receives 3.000 euros for bringing or accepting each immigrant."
However, there are huge funding requirements for managing immigration and there are specific costs per beneficiary.
In fact, according to the minister's public statement, for the approximately 2.003 unaccompanied minors who were being hosted at the time, approximately 90% of the funding came from European funds or from an agreement with the Swiss government, while for approximately 21.000 adults the percentage of European funding ranged, as he stated, between 75% and 85%.
So the question changes:
Has immigration turned into a huge financial management industry?
And if so, who controls its real cost?
What is an asylum seeker in Greece really entitled to today?
Here too, precision is needed.
Not every person who enters the country illegally is automatically entitled to all benefits.
Benefits are linked to a specific legal status, mainly to the status of an applicant for international protection.
According to the Ministry of Immigration and Asylum itself, material reception conditions may include:
housing,
feeding,
financial aid,
clothing and footwear,
personal hygiene items,
telecommunications,
urban transportation,
school supplies and basic pharmaceutical needs.
The accommodation structures also provide, as appropriate, psychosocial support, access to health services, Greek language courses and skills development programs.
Applicants for international protection have the right to access the public healthcare system, minor children to free public education and, under the conditions of the law, may obtain the right to work after 60 days from the submission of the asylum application.
And how much money do they get in hand?
Here, official figures also debunk many of the exaggerations that are circulating.
The Ministry cites as a full monthly financial aid:
150 euros for one person
270 euros for two people
320 euros for three people
420 euros for a family of four or more people
When meals are also provided in the accommodation, a smaller – partial – allowance is provided:
75 euros for one person
135 euros for two
160 euros for three
210 euros for four people or more.
So, no:
An illegal immigrant does not receive 3.000 euros in hand.
The large amount lies in the cost of operating the entire system around reception and protection.
And this, in our opinion, is even more important to investigate.
Housing and integration programs
For those who obtain international or temporary protection, there are also programs such as HELIOS, which include housing support, Greek language and social skills courses, as well as job counseling.
The program is designed to provide housing support services to up to 5.000 households, corresponding to approximately 11.200 people.
In 2026, beneficiaries of the HELIOS+ program were already registered and were receiving a rental subsidy.
And here again we ask:
What is the total cost of all these programs per person and per family?
And now we pay for them to leave?
Here the discussion becomes even more interesting.
The Assisted Voluntary Return program of the International Organization for Migration provides financial assistance:
1.000 euros per person for those residing in mainland Greece
and
500 euros per person for those residing on the islands.
And that's not all.
The program may also cover the issuance of travel documents, airfare to the country of origin, necessary internal travel, and reintegration support upon return.
There is also a separate voluntary return program through the Greek Police, which provides assistance of 300 euros for non-prisoners and 200 euros for prisoners who choose to return.
And the columnist can't help but wonder:
So first we pay for entry into the system, then for hospitality, then for food, then for services, and finally we pay again to make the return?
Obviously an organized return has a cost.
And apparently it can even be more economical for the state than a person's long-term stay in a structure.
But then there is a reasonable question:
Why doesn't the State present us with a complete and completely transparent account?
And at the same time, what is happening with the unemployed Greek?
From April 1, 2026, the regular unemployment subsidy from the DYPA may, depending on previous earnings, be 565 euros, 423,75 euros or 282,50 euros per month.
In the pilot system, there are cases in which, as the amount is gradually reduced, even monthly payments of 350 euros or lower appear in certain phases of the subsidy.
And there are hundreds of thousands of registered unemployed.
In July 2026, the DYPA recorded 715.328 registered unemployed people, while 148.138 were subsidized that month.
And here another difficult question arises:
Does the Greek state have the same determination when designing a safety net for its own citizen who has lost his job, cannot pay his rent, or is forced to leave his home?
We don't compare human lives.
We are not saying that a refugee, a minor, or a person in need should not be protected.
The question is different:
Can a state protect the vulnerable who arrive in its country, without simultaneously forgetting the vulnerable who already live within it?
The millions exist – where do they end up?
Only one of the feeding programs in structures of the Reception and Identification Service had a budget that, after amendments, reached approximately 70,6 million euros.
A facility management program for inland structures had a budget of over 93 million euros.
Other actions fund travel, interpreters, legal aid, Asylum Service staff and dozens of other functions.
These are, of course, multi-year programs and not money given directly to immigrants.
But that's exactly the point.
The big money is not necessarily in the immigrant's pocket. It is in the management of immigration.
And therefore we are entitled to ask:
Who undertakes the contracts?
By what criteria?
How much does a meal, a place to stay, a transfer, a service really cost?
Who checks whether prices are reasonable?
Who evaluates the effectiveness of the programs?
How much money was spent in total over the last ten years?
And what was the measurable result?
Immigration doesn't need slogans. It needs an account.
We will not write that "each immigrant gets 3.000 euros," because it is not true.
However, we will write what emerges from the data itself:
That the total cost of an unaccompanied minor can approach, according to the minister himself, 3.000 euros per month.
That an adult can have total management costs of hundreds of euros per month.
That housing, food, financial assistance, healthcare, education, integration and return programs are in place.
That hundreds of millions of European and national funds are being channeled into this policy.
And that now the question must be said out loud:
Is migration only a humanitarian and geopolitical crisis, or has a huge economic mechanism been created around it?
Who really benefits from it?
Who controls the money?
And why doesn't the Greek citizen have a clear, unified and detailed account in front of him?
Human dignity is non-negotiable.
But transparency in the management of public and European money should not be negotiable either.
The citizen has the right to know.
And journalism has an obligation to ask.
We have Genocide and no one is talking.
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