'Burgergeld'

It's a new term being thrown around in Germany this week.

So for almost twenty years....we had a social welfare system that was referred to as 'Hartz IV'.  There would be a program to pay for your rent, heat and utilities.....and then there would be around 430 Euro per adult in the family for food and expense money.

The SPD Party has stood up and spoken to this new program....'Burgergeld' would replace Hartz IV.

How much is the cost?  The SPD say they need roughly four to six billion extra Euro to finance this program (a hefty amount).  Focus (the news magazine) asked an independent finance analyst to look it over, and Bernd Raffelhüschen says it's closer to 20 billion Euro.  It's a big difference.

Will this pass? 

There are three key things going on.  First, the SPD minister in charge of the budget business....has admitted already that 2019 is a less-than-thrilling year, with a five-billion Euro shortfall likely for government revenue.  Normally, this would be the wrong period to start something like this.

Second, there's also chatter from the SPD about raising pension rates to a minimum of 900-Euro per retiree, and taking it straight out of regular tax revenue (not the pension tax bucket).  That idea is said to be in the three to four billion Euro range.

Third, both of these issues....the pensioner crisis and the social welfare saga....have been long discussed, for over 20 years.  It's like the SPD Party suddenly woke up from some big party and realized how many voters they lost over the past twenty years, and now trying to make it up via pensioners and welfare voters.

Either massive tax increases are going to occur, or the German Bundeswehr is going to see a 10-percent cut in their budget (maybe even both events occur).

So when you hear Burgergeld.....it's just 'citizen-money' and relates to welfare cases.