Good decision. Who in their right mind would cut benefits with a cost of living crisis? That’d just make it worse.
The part of the german “welfare state” that is up for discussion here, is the Bürgergeld. Which is basically what people get to guarantee the existential minimum. To ensure that they get only the precise amount for it, the amount is calculated with a special formula, which is part of a law that was implemented in 2022. A law by the way, that was voted by the SPD, the Greens, the FDP and parts of the CDU.
If they would want to implement cuts, they would need to come up with basically a new law and they would need to bring this through both the Bundestag and the Bundesrat. Which is unlikely at the moment and highly unlikely to happen in time. Also the relevant government agency has already declared that these changes are practically impossible to implement for the year 2024.
Which means the only part left where our government could implement cuts, is the pension system. Although this would probably much easier, I doubt that the CDU would want this under any circumstance. Yet it would probably make more sense in the current situation.
germany as greece. Now up to germany to sell some islands or why not munich
Awesome.
Instead of cutting financial welfare for asylum seekers and giving them non-financial benefits like food and goods, therefore increasing minimum wages to get people into jobs, we stick with the status quo. Awesome. Love how my 50% taxes are being used to benefit the right people.
No-one asked you what you aren’t going to do, Olaf.
We asked you what you are going to do.
Big talks for a man whos government failed to pass a budget for 2024. I wanna see him increase taxes and watch the government go below 30% in polls, at the latest then the FDP base will pull the plug and end this clowns rule.
Why else is he gonna say? American perspective here… Germany will have a rough road ahead. They got addicted to an export based economy and ignored the warning signs for decades now. China is no longer gonna be the export destination it once was. The other EU countries are going through economic downturns. US is putting trade barriers up. And, Germany no longer has access to the cheap Russian gas.
If Trump comes back into power, NATO is likely dead. That means Germany will have to spend a ton more on military too. I don’t know if the welfare state survives all this…
Right-wing media in Germany goes bonkers about Bürgergeld welfare payments as if its so irresistable to conduct a degrading financial striptease at the welfare office and having to give an explanation for every single life decision at the welfare office to receive the existential minimum. I genuinely hate how CDU and FDP portray welfare recipients.
If Germany needs money, how about overhauling taxation to close up loopholes? “*Cum Ex*” for caused **damages** worth approx. 36 billion Euros. How about getting rid of privileges for goods and services used by the upper class? People pay more VAT on clothing from H&M than on certain luxury goods. How about revamping the retirement system so the state does not has to pay an additional 120 billion Euros to subsidies the system (*of which we know its is destined to fail at one point for fourty years*).
And finally: how about not viewing national debt the same way as private debt? Germany is in dire need of investments **everywhere,** but instead they want to do austerity, which will devastate this nation where everything is already working increasingly on emergency mode.
Anyway. Current government coalition is just at 33 percent with SPD being weaker than the Green Party. I wouldn’t be surprised if state elections would cause the loss of majority in the Bundesrat and thus ending the government ability to do legislation. That would inevitably cause elections and that would be the end for Scholz.
This “crisis” is entirely imaginary anyway. The German government would be fine going over budget and lending more money like other states if conservatives hadn’t enshrined a ridiculous concept of fiscal austerity into the German constitution.
Why not? When you can’t get cheap resources or goods from countries you decide are “unfriendly” because you have the gigantic behind to kiss across the Atlantic ocean, you need to be prepared to deal with your own budget.
13 comments
Good decision. Who in their right mind would cut benefits with a cost of living crisis? That’d just make it worse.
The part of the german “welfare state” that is up for discussion here, is the Bürgergeld. Which is basically what people get to guarantee the existential minimum. To ensure that they get only the precise amount for it, the amount is calculated with a special formula, which is part of a law that was implemented in 2022. A law by the way, that was voted by the SPD, the Greens, the FDP and parts of the CDU.
If they would want to implement cuts, they would need to come up with basically a new law and they would need to bring this through both the Bundestag and the Bundesrat. Which is unlikely at the moment and highly unlikely to happen in time. Also the relevant government agency has already declared that these changes are practically impossible to implement for the year 2024.
Which means the only part left where our government could implement cuts, is the pension system. Although this would probably much easier, I doubt that the CDU would want this under any circumstance. Yet it would probably make more sense in the current situation.
germany as greece. Now up to germany to sell some islands or why not munich
Awesome.
Instead of cutting financial welfare for asylum seekers and giving them non-financial benefits like food and goods, therefore increasing minimum wages to get people into jobs, we stick with the status quo. Awesome. Love how my 50% taxes are being used to benefit the right people.
No-one asked you what you aren’t going to do, Olaf.
We asked you what you are going to do.
Big talks for a man whos government failed to pass a budget for 2024. I wanna see him increase taxes and watch the government go below 30% in polls, at the latest then the FDP base will pull the plug and end this clowns rule.
Why else is he gonna say? American perspective here… Germany will have a rough road ahead. They got addicted to an export based economy and ignored the warning signs for decades now. China is no longer gonna be the export destination it once was. The other EU countries are going through economic downturns. US is putting trade barriers up. And, Germany no longer has access to the cheap Russian gas.
If Trump comes back into power, NATO is likely dead. That means Germany will have to spend a ton more on military too. I don’t know if the welfare state survives all this…
Right-wing media in Germany goes bonkers about Bürgergeld welfare payments as if its so irresistable to conduct a degrading financial striptease at the welfare office and having to give an explanation for every single life decision at the welfare office to receive the existential minimum. I genuinely hate how CDU and FDP portray welfare recipients.
If Germany needs money, how about overhauling taxation to close up loopholes? “*Cum Ex*” for caused **damages** worth approx. 36 billion Euros. How about getting rid of privileges for goods and services used by the upper class? People pay more VAT on clothing from H&M than on certain luxury goods. How about revamping the retirement system so the state does not has to pay an additional 120 billion Euros to subsidies the system (*of which we know its is destined to fail at one point for fourty years*).
And finally: how about not viewing national debt the same way as private debt? Germany is in dire need of investments **everywhere,** but instead they want to do austerity, which will devastate this nation where everything is already working increasingly on emergency mode.
Anyway. Current government coalition is just at 33 percent with SPD being weaker than the Green Party. I wouldn’t be surprised if state elections would cause the loss of majority in the Bundesrat and thus ending the government ability to do legislation. That would inevitably cause elections and that would be the end for Scholz.
This “crisis” is entirely imaginary anyway. The German government would be fine going over budget and lending more money like other states if conservatives hadn’t enshrined a ridiculous concept of fiscal austerity into the German constitution.
Why not? When you can’t get cheap resources or goods from countries you decide are “unfriendly” because you have the gigantic behind to kiss across the Atlantic ocean, you need to be prepared to deal with your own budget.
Proven that austerity does not work. Well done
Edit: link – https://www.ucl.ac.uk/european-institute/analysis/news-remigration/austerity#:~:text=According%20to%20most%20prominent%20economists,as%20a%20result%20of%20austerity.
Hiii
awesome , now dont ask us to do those cuts in our country