Anyone who wants can donate money to the state, but hardly anyone wants it.
(Photo: IMAGO/serienlicht)
Berlin Marlene Engelhorn is a descendant of the BASF company founder Friedrich Engelhorn, will inherit double-digit millions and would like to pay significantly more taxes. With about 60 other millionaires, she is involved in the “taxmenow” (“Tax me now”) initiative, which advocates higher taxation for the wealthy.
But if you want, you could already give more money to the state today. Not directly as a tax, but by donation. In 2006, the federal government established a “debt repayment account,” and since then, citizens have been able to voluntarily transfer money to their state. Solo: Hardly anyone uses it.
Until shortly before Christmas, only 55,589.46 euros had been received this year, the Federal Ministry of Finance informed the Handelsblatt upon request. The total amount that has been transferred to the federal government since the opening of the account in 2006 is also manageable: To date, citizens have donated a total of 1.38 million euros to their state. For comparison: statistically, taxpayers transfer the same amount to the Treasury in less than two minutes.
There is enough national debt that needs to be paid off. This year alone, the federal government has decided to take on half a trillion euros of new debt. But even in times when the state has to go into record debts due to the Corona virus, the energy crisis and the war in Ukraine, the debt repayment account is not used. And this has its reasons.
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One of them: The account is little known. The Federal Ministry of Finance deliberately does not advertise this. The government does not expect such contributions from citizens, nor does it aim to encourage people to make payments, the ministry said.
No ads for the donation account
The IRS does not want to beg its own citizens or compete with organizations or charities for donations. “The state does not depend on donations to finance the federal budget and should not convey this impression by actively soliciting donations,” the federal ministry of finance said.
The account cannot even be found on the Federal Ministry of Finance’s website. At least the CDU cannot understand this. This would unnecessarily create obstacles for benefactors who want to do good for the state. The Union should at least be able to find the bill.
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The opposition believes it is equally wrong that donors do not receive even a thank you from the state. That would be the bare minimum. The Federal Ministry of Finance sees it differently: If there were costs for letters of thanks or other rewards, according to a letter from the ministry to the FDP parliamentary group, “the planned repayment of the debt would only be partially achieved”.
Therefore, the donor does not receive a donation receipt, which means that the donation to the state is not tax deductible. This, however, is not even criticized by the opposition. Because a deductibility would go against the basic idea of the debt repayment account: depositors don’t want to save on taxes, they want to give the money to the state.
Germans like to donate, but not to the state
However, the real reason for the reluctance to donate is likely to be other than the account’s lack of publicity or a lack of thank you cards. Because actually the Germans are quite willing to spend money.
The Germans have recently donated around 5.5 billion euros a year to help organisations, animal welfare and sports clubs. According to estimates by the Federal Association of German Foundations, charitable foundations contain another 68 billion euros. Apparently, citizens don’t just want to anonymously transfer money to a federal account that the state can then use to reduce debt.
But if you still want to make a contribution to debt relief: In a small inquiry in April, CDU party leader Friedrich Merz asked the federal government to calculate how much each citizen would have to transfer to the debt repayment account so that Germany was in debt – free. In April, it was a one-off per capita of €17,507 for 83.2 million people and €1.457 trillion in debt.
More: Because this millionaire thinks he pays too little in taxes
