2024-02-18 14:42:09
Pensioners in Germany have to dig deeper into their pockets. Taxes have risen by almost eight billion euros within a year.
According to federal government data, the total taxes and social security contributions for pensioners have increased significantly and are expected to reach a good 124 billion euros this year. This emerges from the Finance Ministry’s response to a request from Bundestag member Sahra Wagenknecht, which was submitted to the German Press Agency. Wagenknecht criticized the burden and called for tax exemption for small and medium-sized pensions.
For 2024, the ministry refers to estimates and simulation calculations based on data from previous years. Accordingly, 54.3 billion euros in contributions for statutory health insurance and 11.5 billion euros for nursing care insurance will be due in the current year. For comparison: in 2020 there were 44.3 billion euros for health insurance and 8.5 billion euros for nursing care insurance. According to the ministry, the amount of tax due will increase from 48.8 billion euros in 2020 to 58.6 billion euros in 2024. Read here from when you have to pay taxes as a pensioner.
Wagenknecht: “Reform was a fatal mistake”
The rising social security contributions are primarily explained by increases in the care contribution and the additional contribution for health insurance. Read here what pensioners can do about it. In addition, the number of pensioners is growing. The increasing tax amounts for pensioners were laid out in a reform in 2004 in this way: gradually an ever larger part of the pension is subject to tax, while the contributions during the working phase are made tax-free.
Wagenknecht demanded a change of course. “The state is digging ever deeper into older people’s already thin wallets,” criticized Sahra Wagenknecht, chairwoman of the Alliance party. The total of over 124 billion euros in taxes and duties is 7.8 billion euros higher than last year. Within four years it had increased by 22 percent.
“The taxes and contributions for pensioners are now higher than the entire federal subsidy for pensions – an outrage,” said Wagenknecht. “The burden of taxes and contributions must come down.” Health and nursing care insurance contributions have risen too much and the abolition of pension taxation must be on the agenda. “This reform was a fatal mistake,” said Wagenknecht. “We need tax exemption for all statutory pensions up to at least 2,000 euros.”