A litmus test for the coalition’s willingness to reform

Employers’ President Dr Rainer Dulger comments on the first reading in the Bundestag of the Statutory Health Insurance Contribution Rate Stabilisation Act:

A litmus test for the coalition’s willingness to reform

Berlin, 12 June 2026. “The governing parties must implement the proposals of the Health Finance Commission as comprehensively as possible. This is a litmus test of the coalition’s willingness to reform. On Wednesday, we all committed ourselves to reforms at the Federal Chancellery. This commitment must now be followed by action.

The package put forward by Federal Minister Nina Warken points in the right direction: at the current pace, expenditure in statutory health insurance cannot continue to rise.

However, the current expenditure dynamics also show that the measures planned so far are not sufficient to keep contribution rates stable. The aim must be to put all cost-reducing and efficiency-enhancing proposals of the Commission into practice.

Those who apply the brakes now risk ever higher health insurance contributions. This increases labour costs and hinders economic growth.

The task now is clear: refine the reform plans and achieve the financial stabilisation of statutory health insurance.”