The Union Chancellor candidate complains: “The calculation doesn’t add up.” But the SPD wants to make its tax plans a campaign hit – based on concrete calculations.
SPD leader Saskia Esken has defended the Social Democrats’ redistribution plans for the upcoming federal election campaign. Union Chancellor candidate Friedrich Merz is meanwhile “shocked” by the SPD’s course. The Chancellor’s party receives support from the German Federation of Trade Unions (DGB).
“The income tax reform should be internally financed,” explained party leader Saskia Esken at the end of an SPD board meeting for the first tangible preparation for the upcoming federal election campaign. According to Esken, higher income from one percent of taxpayers should finance the reduction for 95 percent.
SPD announces concrete bill
“That’s why they have to be taken into account,” said Esken. “We will do that in our government program.” This refers to the election program with which the SPD wants to once again apply to take on government responsibility in a leading position. A party conference will take place on June 21 next year to select the incumbent Chancellor as the new candidate, as Esken announced.
The SPD leader defended the plans. “Currently, someone who has to pay tax on 67,000 euros a year pays the same rate as someone who has to pay tax on 250,000 euros. And that is unfair.” Too many middle-income people paid too high taxes.
Merz: “The calculation doesn’t add up”
CDU leader Merz criticized the SPD plans as completely unrealistic. “This is a burden for medium-sized businesses,” said Merz on the ARD program “Caren Miosga”. The SPD wants to make the one percent at the top of the income scale “a little more responsible,” as it decided in a strategy paper. Merz countered: “The calculation doesn’t add up.” Those affected are also not the higher earners. “These are the top performers in our society.” These include many medium-sized entrepreneurs or craft businesses who would then have a tax burden of 60 percent plus.
SPD versus CDU – and vice versa
He was “even more shocked” because of the “old pattern” at the SPD. “More state, more debt, more bureaucracy, higher taxes for the rich, as the SPD always likes to call it,” said the Union faction leader. “If they continue this jargon in Germany, then we don’t have to be surprised about the migration of companies to neighboring countries in Europe.”
Esken outlined what else is central to the SPD, in addition to relieving the burden on the center and the promised rescue of threatened industry. “An active state takes the social infrastructure into account in order to take the stress out of people’s everyday lives.” Daycare centers, bus and train infrastructure, apartments and bridges would have to be built or expanded. A higher tax on the rich and a higher top tax rate should serve as financing.
“A directional decision”
“This federal election will be a real directional decision,” said Esken. The new SPD general secretary Matthias Miersch also spoke of such a decision. “Citizens will have to decide whether to go back to old mothballs. That’s what Friedrich Merz’s approach represents,” he said in a podcast from Politico magazine. “We are ideally positioned,” said Esken, also with a view to the fact that the SPD leadership wants to send Olaf Scholz into the race for the chancellorship again, while the Union has unanimously agreed on Friedrich Merz.
Backing from the DGB
Support for the SPD plans comes from the German Federation of Trade Unions, which celebrated its 75th birthday on Sunday in solidarity with the Federal President, Scholz and other SPD politicians. “With our tax concept, we have shown how it can be done in a revenue-neutral manner,” said DGB board member Stefan Körzell to the German Press Agency. “95 percent of employees can very well be relieved of income tax if top earners and top wealth have to contribute more to the community.”
Körzell said: “Nurses, construction workers and daycare teachers are also key performers in our society.” They urgently need more net from gross. “It is absolutely right to involve the higher earners and wealthy people more.” The SPD’s plans were heading in the right direction.
Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
