The traffic light government started almost a year ago with many ambitious goals. But in view of the many new challenges, which are mainly related to Russia’s war of aggression, hardly anything has happened in some projects. They are important, as our selection shows.
War on the doorstep, rearmament of the Bundeswehr, skyrocketing energy prices, concerns about Germany’s de-industrialization, a gas price cap that is as necessary as it is expensive – all these are the visible signs of the turning point that Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) felt after the attack of Russia on Ukraine has announced. But there is another side to this development that the traffic light government prefers not to address.
It’s about all the projects that were named as urgent in the coalition agreement and made great promises, but which have now ended up on the back burner or on the long bench under the signs of the turning point. They may also face the fate of being discarded altogether. Four concrete projects, about which there had been ongoing discussions among the coalition partners because of their importance, are now stuck.
The top issue in the election campaign was the construction of new apartments. Rapidly rising rents and real estate prices, which seemed to know no bounds, prompted the traffic light coalition to write the target of 400,000 new apartments to be built per year in their contract. Chancellor Scholz specifically named a good confidante, the SPD politician Klara Geywitz, as Minister of Construction. But the goal is further than ever.
The reform for the new property tax is complex – and this year it will require owners. You have to submit some data to the tax office. You have to be very precise and observe special deadlines. In our large guide you will find all the information you need to know in a compact form.
It may be that the number of completions this year will not even reach the 300,000 mark and will still be below last year’s. In any case, trade and the construction industry have long since waved it off. Axel Gedaschko, President of the Central Association of the Housing Industry GdW says: “It will be the case that the goal will not be reached in the next few years either.” Everything is missing: workers, materials, money. In addition, energy-saving building codes for homes tend to complicate rather than simplify construction. A back and forth in funding led to uncertainty among the builders.
A second favorite topic, this time the FDP, is stock rent. However, it is still in the preparation stage and there is nothing to be seen of it – certainly not the ten billion euros that were supposed to be made available for start-up financing. So far they have not been included in the budget. In the coalition negotiations, the FDP had urged that at least a first step be taken towards partially funded statutory pensions.
“We are working flat out on the reform, which is, however, a very complex undertaking,” says Florian Toncar, Parliamentary State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF), in an interview with the specialist journal “Fonds beruf”. “We have not yet received the sum included in the budget because there is still no law on share pensions, and therefore no recipient for the ten billion euros.” In fact, there are still many unanswered questions: Where does the money come from? How should it multiply so that it becomes a serious contribution to the pension insurance, which pays out around 300 billion euros in pensions annually? And who should manage the fund? One thing is clear: so far, the topic has provided more open questions than answers.
FDP leader Lindner also came up with the idea that employees in start-ups should be able to invest in their company at low taxes. The project is intended to advance the startup culture in Germany, whose delicate little plants we are proud of in this country, but where there is still room for improvement. This includes the possibility of participation in the company. “In Germany I will
Among other things, it is about the point in time at which founders have to pay tax on their company shares. You currently have the problem of “dry income”. According to this, employees have to pay taxes when purchasing the shares without having received capital from them at the time. With the reform, they should also be able to count on a reduced tax rate when selling their shares in the future. The upcoming “Future Financing Act” will fix it. It was announced that the tax allowance would be increased from EUR 1,440 to EUR 5,000.
When asked by the Federal Ministry of Finance, its spokesman did not give a specific date. Instead, he referred to the European Union: “The talks at European level should be completed by the end of the year. We also have the dry-income problem in mind and therefore want to expand the provisions on the deferred taxation of non-cash benefits from employee shareholdings.” However, the spokesman left open when that would happen.
There is also little to be heard of a fourth, once also very urgent topic – this time in the house of SPD Health Minister Karl Lauterbach. “We are accelerating the introduction of the electronic patient file and the e-prescription, as well as their beneficial application, and we are connecting all players to the telematics infrastructure at an accelerated rate,” says the coalition agreement. The patient file is actually a practical invention: From now on, everyone has their entire medical history on their insurance card, so that every doctor can immediately see who he is dealing with.
Medicines and prescriptions are also recorded and can be obtained. Around 73 million people in Germany have the opportunity to use the electronic patient file. But implementation is slow. By July, exactly 501,153 people with statutory health insurance had opted for an electronic patient file, which corresponds to 0.6 percent of possible users. Why? The file isn’t working well, doctors complain.
If you want them, you have to actively approach your own health insurance company. The registration process is complicated. Even digital professionals reach their limits. The start in the medical practices was bumpy, which was due to the fact that the necessary hardware and software was not yet available everywhere. Lauterbach has announced that it will completely redesign the electronic patient file. The Minister of Health wants more data for research purposes to be able to be obtained in this way. However, this does not sound like an acceleration of the process.
The article “The traffic light is wasting its big promises” comes from WirtschaftsKurier.
