2024-08-03 11:27:39
When it comes to the obligation to register, the new sanctions go even further than the old ones from the Hartz IV system: previously, anyone who missed an appointment could only be penalized with a 10 percent reduction in their standard rate, now it is 30 percent. And the reasonable commute time for a job is now three hours, half an hour longer than before the introduction of the citizen’s allowance.
But expert Schäfer also puts a limit on this. “All of this is initially just a theoretical possibility,” he says. “In practice, this does not necessarily have to lead to a tougher approach. Because unlike in the Hartz IV system, the path to sanctions via a special review procedure for possible hardships is much more complicated and time-consuming. The traffic light coalition does not want to change anything about this.”
It is therefore doubtful that the job centers will actually use the greater scope for sanctions more often. “With the citizen’s allowance, politicians have sent the signal: we want fewer sanctions. That genie is difficult to put back in the bottle,” said Schäfer.
CDU General Secretary Carsten Linnemann recently called for an even tougher approach to the citizen’s allowance. In an interview with the newspapers of the Funke media group, he suggested that the citizen’s allowance should be completely cut off for more than 100,000 people, the so-called “total objectors” who simply do not want to work. “The statistics suggest that a six-figure number of people are fundamentally unwilling to accept a job,” he said.
The Greens, the Left Party and social associations then accused Linnemann of populism and incitement and questioned the scale of the figures. From the FDP, deputy parliamentary group leader Christoph Meyer spoke up and partially came to Linnemann’s aid. Basic security is “help in times of need”. “However, if the citizen’s allowance is exploited as an unconditional income, social peace in the country is in danger – that only helps the political fringes,” he told t-online. “The SPD and the Greens must finally understand this too.”
How much a total withdrawal of the citizen’s allowance would actually achieve, and whether it would really lead to tens of thousands more people finding work, is a matter of debate. Trade unionists and numerous economists say that instead of more pressure, better qualifications are needed. “The vast majority of recipients want to work,” says Marcel Fratzscher, President of the German Institute for Economic Research. “The greatest potential for reducing the number of recipients of the citizen’s allowance in the long term is through qualification measures and an increase in the minimum wage, as this would reduce the number of people receiving top-ups.”