>>>There is a region in the East that is making money, there’s also a region in the East that is bleeding money like crazy. Somehow he asserts that the money-making region is feeding the west; not the neighbouring eastern region of Donbas or the equally bleeding south, but the west<<<
Well, Ivan Mazepa finally fond a single most depressive state in the East, and it still contributes more in tax revenue to Ukraine than any Western state, apart from Lviv (which is the best performing Western state).
This one depressed region in the east (Donbas) has a deficit more than twice that of Galicia. They can contribute all they want to the budget but if they take out way more than they put it, what’s the point.
An argument can be made that profits from Lviv help to sustain Donbas, (but it’s as valid as the one that East is feeding the West, ie not)