BDA AGENDA 16/24 | COMMENT OF THE WEEK | August 15, 2024

Dr. Ottilie Klein, MdB, CDU, Member of Parliament for the Berlin-Mitte constituency

Olaf Scholz described the current draft budget as a "work of art", while SPD parliamentary group leader Mützenich spoke of necessary "tricks". On closer inspection, it quickly becomes clear that these are more likely to be "magic tricks": For example, the Ampel is setting the noble goal of saving 5.5 billion euros on the citizens' income next year. Instead of 50.5 billion, only 44.95 billion is to flow into the tax-financed support for the unemployed. The lion's share, namely 4.7 of the 5.5 billion, is to be saved by getting people out of the citizens' allowance and into work.

So much for the "magic", now let's move on to the "tricks": in order to save 4.7 billion in citizens' benefits, the traffic light - as a question from my colleague Jens Spahn shows - would have to place 700,000 people in work next year. The last time there were so many job placements was in 2007 after the introduction of Hartz IV. Today, we are seeing the opposite trend: unemployment is growing significantly. Compared to the previous year, the number of unemployed people in July 2024 was 192,000, a whole 7 percent higher. The reason for this is not only the poor economic situation, but also the completely misguided traffic light citizens' allowance. Enzo Weber from the employee-oriented IAB has calculated that 5.7% fewer people on basic income support have taken up a job as a result of the citizen's income reform.

The latest announcements by the traffic light government to introduce new bogus measures in the form of longer commutes, monthly participation and tougher sanctions in the Citizen's Income will not change this: in times of labor shortages, the local availability of vacancies is certainly not the decisive hurdle to finding work. There is also a lack of staff in the job centers to conduct monthly consultations with all clients. In addition, Federal Minister Heil introduced a "total sanction" for "total refusers" in the citizen's allowance back in March, but this has not been applied once to date, as it is designed to be completely impractical - possibly deliberately. The measures which, according to Ampel, are intended to bring about mass employment are thus turning out to be symbolic politics that are out of touch with reality.

Conclusion: Instead of tackling real reforms to the Citizen's Income, the chronically divided traffic light party is presenting fantasy figures in its draft budget in order to recoup the missing billions next year through a supplementary budget. The savings thus remain wishful thinking, the measures trickery.

As the CDU, on the other hand, we hold true to Konrad Adenauer's "We can't do magic, but we can work": With our "New Basic Security", we have developed a concept that abolishes the citizen's income in its current form and returns to a strict system of support and demands. Because for us it is clear: help should go to those who are really in need. However, those who are on the citizen's income and can work must also go to work.