Citizens’ allowance expenses increase to 47 billion euros

Payments for people in the citizen benefit rose to 46.9 billion euros last year – an increase of around four billion euros. This emerges from the response from the Federal Ministry of the Federal Ministry to a small request from the AfD in the Bundestag.

In total, there were around 5.5 million recipients in 2024 including children and adolescents, including almost 4 million employees – i.e. people who are fundamentally able to work at least three hours a day. According to the government, around 24.7 billion euros or 52.6 percent of the total amount were paid to Germans, 22.2 billion euros in people without a German passport (47.4 percent). This division is roughly at the level of the previous year.

In the group of foreigners, several hundred thousand Ukrainians and their children who have fled to Germany before the Russian attack war have been fled to Germany since 2022. According to the ministry, they flowed around 6.3 billion euros in 2024. Accordingly, 7.4 billion euros were paid to people from the eight most important asylum cups.

AfD MP René Springer criticized: “The expenditure on citizenship money continues to shoot up uncontrollably.” He combined this with the demand: “Foreigners must fundamentally deny access to citizens’ allowance.”

However, Enzo Weber from the Institute for Labor Market and Vocational Research (IAB) in Nuremberg contradicts both points. The recent increase in the total amount is explained, among other things, with a significant increase in rule rates in 2023 and 2024 because of inflation. A round round followed this year, this is also expected for 2026.

“So this is not a trend that will go on foreseeable so,” said Weber of the German Press Agency. The number of beneficiaries beneficiaries has also been declining since autumn 2024. “This is a trend reversal,” said the scientist.

Weber gives a plausible one that almost half of the citizens’ money recipients are foreigners. People who were already busy in Germany are usually entitled to unemployment insurance benefits in the event of unemployment and often find new employment in the period. Refugees, on the other hand, came unprepared in the German labor market and started with considerable disadvantages.

Therefore, it is important that people in civil allowance would get help to start the labor market, said Weber. This is not the case in the system of services for asylum seekers. “We should not understand basic security as a problem, but as a fit maker,” said Weber. “We have to invest first to get the costs down. Nothing is as expensive as structural unemployment.”

According to IAB results, 100,000 recipients mean less than three billion euros more for public budgets. The employment rate is now growing among Ukrainian refugees – from 24.8 percent in October 2023 to 33.2 percent. However, integration with language courses and qualification should go faster, said Weber. The Federal Audit Office had recently complained about deficits in the mediation of people in the citizens’ allowance.

The German Trade Union Confederation turned against the AfD’s demands and recalled that Germany needed immigration. “Instead of sensible politics, the AfD only exists and hatred, regardless of whether it is migrants or people with a legitimate claim to the welfare state,” said board member Anja Piel the dpa. “Everyone has the right to secure existence in need. Social progress is the foundation of our functioning democracy.”

The social association Germany also gave the AfD contra. It is not expedient to play out social groups against each other – whether employed people against pensioners and people in citizens’ money or people with and without a German passport, said SOVD CEO Michaela Engelmeier. “This is even dangerous because it fueled the division of society and serves as a toxic breeding ground for envy debates, hatred and agitation.”