2023-08-27 19:53:49
Before the cabinet meeting at Meseberg Castle in Brandenburg, trade unions and business associations called on the government to unite. The meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday offers the opportunity for an economic policy change of course, said employer president Rainer Dulger of the dpa news agency. “The strategic competitiveness of our country must now be the focus of all political action. Some of the traffic lights don’t understand that – and are sleepwalking through the crisis.”
The government is threatening to stumble on the economic policy restart at the beginning of the second half of the government, said Dulger as President of the Confederation of German Employers’ Associations (BDA). “The longer politicians wait, the harder it hits the location – and the greater the loss of prosperity. Meseberg is an opportunity for a change of course.” Germany is in a difficult situation, companies need to be relieved of additional wage costs and bureaucracy.
Businesses and the “hard-working middle” of the population must be at the center of the political debate, Dulger said. “Instead, voters are being told the industry is bad for our environment. The fact that our prosperity has to be generated just as much as the money for social welfare is often concealed. Something doesn’t add up.”
“The traffic light must solve problems instead of being one itself”
“More cohesion is needed at the traffic lights for more cohesion in society,” said the head of IG Metall, Jörg Hofmann, the “Tagesspiegel”. Meseberg must become a “sign of unity”.
Legislative projects such as the Growth Opportunities Act and basic child security, important issues and also controversial issues must be “processed and processed constructively and without loud noises”, Hofmann demanded. Key topics at the closed conference include the economic situation, digitization and modernization of administration.
Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner considers sticking to the debt brake and not raising taxes to be elementary for the existence of the traffic light coalition. “If we were forced to suspend the debt brake or raise taxes, then the question of a coalition would arise. But nobody does that,” said the FDP leader on Sunday in the ZDF “summer interview” in Berlin.
When asked whether both points are a red line for him, Lindner replies: “It’s in the coalition agreement. And in view of the economic development, it would really be unwise to increase the tax burden.” The companies suffered from the high energy prices, they had to go down. For example, he himself is open to lowering the electricity tax. “But instead of making progress there, we are discussing tax increases. That would not be possible with the FDP.”
Fighting inflation as the biggest threat at the moment
But with a view to tax increases and the debt brake, he said: “Nobody actually intends to do that.” There are public statements by the SPD and the Greens here. “But I can’t see that there are serious attempts to deviate from our stipulations in the coalition agreement. So in that respect theory,” emphasized the FDP chairman.
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