A person who receives citizen’s allowance has just under six euros per day for food. For a child under five years old, it is around three euros and 80 cents per day. That is the reality of life for these people. And then Christian Lindner (FDP) is confronted by the SPD MP Rolf Mützenich askedas Finance Minister, to please make further savings proposals. Mr. Lindner then says that the citizen’s allowance is 24 euros higher than required and that this would allegedly cost taxpayers 1 billion euros.
Yes, dear Mr Lindner, social benefits are expensive. But they are necessary, because they are about securing a minimum standard of living and protecting human dignity and human rights. It is part of our social system that people who are in need of help are supported and taken care of. These people are on social transfer payments for reasons. I would like all people who criticize the welfare state to look into the background.
Citizens’ allowance recipients are not numbers, but people. Everyone should have learned by now that they are not a homogenous mass. The 2023 figures from the Federal Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs show that of over five million citizens’ allowance recipients, around one and a half million are children living in need-based communities. I really wonder, Mr. Lindner, whether it makes sense to cut children’s benefits? I know that children have a hard time in your politics because they don’t contribute anything. But you forget that these little people will be the taxpayers of tomorrow and, to put it bluntly, our future. Therefore, it makes no sense to save on children. I can only recommend that you look at the standard rates for children and consider whether they are realistic.
They propagate the principle of performance and, with their demand for 24 euros less in the citizens’ allowance, they mock the 800,000 people in Germany who receive supplementary benefits. These people work and yet cannot live off the money they have earned. Have you ever considered the reality of these people’s lives?
What kind of lazy people are we talking about here?
Around 700,000 people who receive citizen’s allowance are in training, looking after children or relatives. The caring relatives and single parents are the people who often do care work 24 hours a day. And you want to cut the money for these people?
Around 400,000 people receiving citizen’s allowance are taking part in a measure. This is intended to help them integrate better into the job market. Since citizen’s allowance was introduced, the idea was to give people the opportunity to get school qualifications or to do more retraining and further training, which would make sense given our shortage of skilled workers. Unfortunately, this method did not last long. Saving is more important. So all of these training opportunities were cut again, despite the shortage of skilled workers.
Around 250,000 people who receive the citizen’s allowance are sick. They are looking for therapy or rehabilitation places or are trying to apply for a disability pension. It’s strange that we can’t even grant sick people 24 euros a month.
There are currently around 1.5 million unemployed people available on the job market. The number of long-term unemployed is around half of that, 870,000 people. The other half will neither be able to eliminate our shortage of skilled workers nor fill all the vacancies on the job market. Either they do not have the qualifications (remember: these opportunities were cut) or there are other obstacles to finding work.
These people all get too much money, and it’s not just the FDP who thinks so. I can tell you from my own long-standing experience of poverty that the money is not enough when people are poor. The social associations also complain that the standard rate is too low.
Breakfast with Merz and Lindner
I wonder whether these people have had any contact with people affected by poverty with their savings proposals. Have they ever been able to get an idea of the reality of life for a social transfer recipient, without the press? I would like to invite the CDU candidate for chancellor, Friedrich Merz, or finance minister Christian Lindner to my house for two days. Without the press. Just the three of us. After we have taken my child to school, on foot or by bike (no, most people affected by poverty don’t have a car and bus fare is rarely feasible), I will invite them to eat from my daily ration of citizen’s allowance of 6.40 euros.
At least breakfast is possible: two coffee drinks from the vending machine for one euro and rolls from the discounter, without butter or margarine, maybe some cold cuts. We could then go to the food bank together. That way we would have food for lunch or dinner for the rest of the day. Alternatively, we could collect deposit bottles together – just so the two politicians know what it’s like. There are people who rely on the deposit because they don’t have enough money. I bet they’ve never done that before.
Oh yes: I hope you know that your demand is illegal, Mr Lindner?
Janina Lütt is affected by poverty, she supports herself and her daughter with a disability pension at the level of the citizen’s allowance. In her regular column on freitag.de she reports on everyday life with too little money, on social policy from a grassroots perspective, on dealing with her depression and on empowerment through the network #ichbinarmutsbetroffen: @armutsbetroffen
