pension
Habeck: Don’t really understand the dispute over the pension package
Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck reminds that, at the request of the FDP, stocks will also play a role in pensions in the future. photo
© Sebastian Christoph Gollnow/dpa
The pension level of 48 percent should be guaranteed. But that will cost a lot of money in the future. The FDP would therefore like to abolish the “pension at 63”. The Greens show no understanding for the dispute.
According to the Vice Chancellor, the Greens can resolve the differences within the traffic light coalition over the pension package Robert Habeck cannot understand. “In short, we don’t really understand the dispute over the pension package,” said the Economics Minister in Berlin. “Because there is an agreement, namely the common will to stabilize the pension level at 48 percent.”
While the FDP relies on savings in social and pension policy, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) strictly rejects cuts for pensioners in Germany. In a current five-point paper that the FDP presidium wanted to adopt today, the Liberals are calling for a “generationally fair budget policy”.
Habeck reminded that, at the request of the FDP, stocks should also play a role in pensions in the future. According to reform plans by Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) and Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP), a new capital stock of 200 billion euros is to be created on the stock market by the mid-2030s in order to gradually create a more sustainable basis for future pension financing. The money should come from the federal government. “We weren’t big fans of it at the beginning, but the way it was done it’s totally okay. We can do it like that,” said Habeck.
There is also the question of how the state can provide more incentives for working in old age, said Habeck, for example through tax regulations. Party leader Ricarda Lang warned of public disputes between the coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP. In the end, the partners would all have to move. Citizens expected solutions.
The pension package actually negotiated is intended to guarantee a pension level of 48 percent by 2039. This costs additional money, so the contribution rate will increase. However, the Liberals strictly reject contribution rates that are too high.