Is Germany being unreasonable? Childfree adults paying more for elder care

[Fauxlein]

"Childfree adults to pay more in elder care contributions — report
According to a report from German media group RND, federal Health Minister Nina Warken has prepared a draft bill that would have adults without children pay a higher percentage of taxes towards publicly-funded elder care.
The bill would have contributions from childfree adults increase by 0.7% over a period of years, meaning they would pay 2.5% of their income each month. Their employer will be expected to pay 1.8%. For adults with children the rates will remain the same: 1.8% for people with one child, 1.55% for people with two children, and 1.3% for people with three or more children.
Under the proposal, all adults over the age of 23 who are working full-time would be affected.
It is unclear when Warken, a member of Chancellor Friedrich Merz's center-right Christian Democrats (CDU), will submit the draft to the cabinet. Her ministry had originally said it would present a proposal for elder care reform in mid-May. With a long-stagnating birthrate mildly buoyed by immigration, Germany needs to act fast to make sure older generations can be taken care of without placing an undue burden on young people."

YABU - German Health Minister is being unreasonable, it's not kids responsibility to look after elderly parents and is unfair to penalise child free people
YANBU - this seems like a fair counterbalance to increasing costs to the state of elder care

I think it’s interesting

As someone who can't have children, my question would be (if they implemented it here) can I opt out of paying taxes towards maternity allowance, schooling, free child care hours, and free school meals? Or does my paying for this offset what I need later in life? I don't want to not pay, I don't actually begrudge paying taxes, as I know the taxes of that generation will pay for care should I need it.

You will have benefited from this of course eg schooling.
The vast majority of taxpayers don’t cover their own costs let alone others but for those that do, do we resent benefits we may not ever receive

I actually didn't know about their 'tax for elder care' system anyway, let alone the 'grading' for number/absence of kids.
At first glance, it seems like an excellent idea 🤔
Why doesn't the UK introduce a similar system?

I agree it should be reframed as a benefit for people with dc.

The state funds most of the care home fees
That is not true. My Mum had a very severe stroke just before Covid and her care home fees were covered by "Pflegegeld" (the amount is depending on the severity of need) which means it came from her health insurance, her pension and still needed to be topped up from her savings. She died before her savings were fully used up but if she'd lived beyond that, we as her children would have had to step in (and we would have).

In Germany there is a system whereby adult children can be asked to contribute towards their parents' care costs.

Conversely those without children have not consumed education, early-years medical care etc and other state supported elements such as childcare.

childfree people were children once were they not?

Hopefully they will be paying tax so even if they arent contributing to their practical care needs they will still contribute through their taxes. Not sure how you could make it fair if they are in prison or a layabout or not contributing for some other reason

Yes, I recall that when a childless great-aunt and great-uncle needed help the cousin who had been looked after by my great-aunt (so that her parents could both work) was notable by her absence.

My cousin and I were exactly the same age and did the same job. When I mentioned my cousin's absence to my mother the reply was "Oh, but K has children..."

I didn't expect K to do a huge amount, but it would have been nice if she'd visited them on occasion - they lived only a few doors from K's parents.

I don’t see a problem as long as it is balanced by parents paying more to cover schooling and children’s healthcare etc.

Sounds like a lot of effort to encourage more children, just increase taxes for everyone to cover government costs including elder care and use something like child benefit to incentivise larger families. What happens if you marry (or are living with) someone with children? Does the 'have a child' go to the step parent and actual parent loses it? And similarly widows or widowers remarrying, or the care giver isn't the biological parent.

It would seem fairer that everyone pays the same, swings and roundabouts, people with children get lots of benefits in terms of free schools, health care, etc and people without children might get the benefit of free elder care or they may pay for their own having no children to leave money to.

After they've saved the state the cost and burden of medically supporting and schooling and potentially housing and offering benefits to multiple children?

They've saved the government money and now they pay more? Fuck that shit..that's well unfair.

I live in Germany.

Adult children who earn over 100 000€ gross per year (individually, not a couple earning 50 000€ each) can now be held liable for a share of elder care.
It used to be any adult child earning more than 1 800€ gross a month (which is basically everyone in a large city).
Long-term care insurance covers the main part of care fees, these are on a sliding scale according to needs (more intense care needs means more coverage).

Now, elders tend to stay in their home longer with visiting care support over here, either by paid/subsidised or family carers.

I should also add that there are some other things normal for Germany, such as obligatory proportions of inheritance in most cases (i.e. spouse gets 50%, equal split amongst any children...) or enforcement of child maintenance (if your ex will not pay, the State will and then chases them for the money - at no cost to you).

One of my children is non verbal and autistic. He won't grow up to care for anybody and will require a lot of care himself. Would he still get us a discount or perhaps we should get a tax penalty?

I disagree with the suggested system as the tax system and an organised society is designed to help people through the ups and downs of life and spread the risk and costs through society. If it's every man and woman for themselves then some people's relative cost (and in turn contribution) will be very high.

I know. I mean the state pay a lot more than in the UK. My Mum is in a care home in the UK and pays for everything other than attendance allowance of around 80 GBP per week.

The birth rate in Germany is 1.35 and in the UK it is 1.41. That's too low to even keep population stable. I think the German approach is wrong though. Young people need to be incentivised to start families rather than punished for not doing so.
I have two sons in their early 20s. Student debt, house ownership completely out of reach, cost of living causing pressure on below average salaries and a precarious job market means that settling down and starting a family seems impossible.
I despair of this government devoid of ideas. Saving a tenner on Thorpe Park is supposed to be good news when today we hear that energy bills will go up by over £200 next year. In 2025, nearly 250k mainly 16-35 year olds left the UK. It's not surprising. The answer is not to tax more though.

This is not true. You have taken out just as much on average as each one of those kids. They are people in their own right and their schooling / healthcare / childcare is a benefit FOR THEM. Not their parents since they are people' not possessions. You also benefitted when you were a child.

this, yes but also how does Germany know that those children will take up caring responsibilities for their parents?

When my husband and I were childless we were dirt skint due to the IVF we were having to pay for. So no, I didn’t have ‘less expenses’. Would you be proposing for all IVF to be state funded?

Germany has gone mad, and not for the first time. There are so many disconnects here, all of them pointed out by posters here, so forgive me for this stupid question - so it is working childless who will pay more? The non-working childless will not pay, correct?

this too.

Yes, in Germany children can be liable for their parents care home fees. The whole system if different.

Personally I think it's a ridiculous proposal.

We have 2 children, under the scheme proposed we would pay less than a couple with only one child. But what about a single child if a single parent? Surely that's "equivalent" to two children for two parents?

I've got a sibling. She lives in Australia and has done for 30 years. Whatever happens, she won't be caring for our mum.

DH lost his mum last year. He was an only child, his parents are divorced. He didn't do any care for his mum as she chose to move 300 miles away so it just wasn't possible.

There are too many variables to make this a fair system

Doesn't always work like that, my mother had three children and she did 90% of caring for her mother. Her sister who had no children did the rest.

In my father's family granddad lived with his DD who had children, he had two children who didn't have children and they did nothing.

Er no!
I live myself and aside from a small council tax reduction, I have no other discounts or benefits available to me! I have to pay 100% of everything so arguably have less disposable income.

I don't consume a lot of public services because I don't have children. Unless a tax-for-use model is adopted for all public services (basically privatisation), this proposal is grossly unfair, and yet again penalises those who have either not had the fortune to meet a partner/have children, or have made this lifestyle choice. People seem very quick to forget that having children is a lifestyle choice.

As the childfree one in my family, it falls to me to do a lot more of the care for my parents as my siblings with children (understandably) have less time. It seems harsh that I would do that and then have to pay more towards my own care.