According to Philipp Amthor, there is no “right to be lazy”, and the CDU therefore wants to cut off citizens’ money for “total refusers”. In “Hard but Fair” one of those affected takes issue with this myth about the lazy unemployed.
The SPD, which always sees itself as the patron saint of the welfare state, has never suffered as much from any social reform as it did from the so-called Hartz reforms, which came into force under SPD Chancellor Gerhard Schröder in 2005. Because of this, countless voters and members turned their backs on the Social Democrats; the protest against the Hartz system was one of the driving forces behind the emergence of the Left Party. When citizens’ money replaced Hartz IV a good year ago, an old trauma seemed to have finally been overcome for the SPD. Now the Union, which helped pass the Citizens’ Benefit Act and forced the traffic light to make many concessions, wants to reopen the old wound. The name should also be removed and replaced by “New Basic Security”.