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

But they're not 'other people's' - they're people in their own right, who will become your doctor/nurse/electrician/builder/accountant/farmer etc etc. Its not about who they 'belong to', but about ensuring there continue to be enough people to take care of the older generations.

I can see the sense of this.
That said childless people do save the state money possibly using less NHS and not using state education.

Agree.

Why?

Many of those people may never be net positive contributors though. A system based on individual tax contributions across a lifetime would actually be more appropriate in the UK.

Interestingly you could use this exact argument - which is valid - and reverse it to say why those who are childfree shouldn't have to pay extra. Just a thought.

I think it’s an awful discriminating idea. Surely those that have DC use services more.

This kind of idea shows up capitalism to be the human Ponzi scheme it really is. More children. More consumers. More older people. More tax. Not sustainable.
As a child free person I have paid in excess of £1.5m in tax in my working life so far and will probably add the same again before I retire. I have never needed any benefits. Rarely used medical care. I have happily supported parental leave, child benefits, schooling as that is good for society. Why therefore is elder care not seen in the same way? How dare I not add another consumer; and if recent figures are anything to go by there aren’t enough jobs to sustain young people anyway. So some of my taxes will be supporting them.
Why is my care as I grow older less important than a supporting a couple with children who have never worked and whose children may never work? Why is my contribution to society during my working lifetime not reciprocated?

The idea that if only people were having more children there would be enough money to pay for the elderly is just a joke. There are 3 million unemployed people in Germany (not including those that can't work), they're costing (according to Google) 55 billion a year. Elderly care apparently costs 60 billion a year.

What is needed, like everywhere, is not more kids - it's more jobs. If all those people had jobs not only would there be no unemployment costs, but they would also all be paying taxes and the cost of elderly care would be easily covered.

I think this is a stupid way to penalise people who don't have kids, who don't get child benefit, school places or NHS care paid for for those kids. They cost the government much less already.

I take it you will be encouraging your own children into these professions or do you just mean other peoples kids. 🤔

Like today then? The vast majority of today’s pensioners take out more than they have paid in. The majority of people are not net contributors but that’s not the only way of measuring contributions.

That's absolutely fine, as people without children will naturally (generally, anyway) need more help from the state as they age.

However.

I would expect to see reduced taxation for the services that childless adults don't use, as that's only fair, too. So really, it should balance out.

That would be easy to prove though, because it would be on your medical records. Maybe there could be a clause that states that people in your position get a special exemption if it can be evidenced that they’ve sought medical assistance with fertility issues.

The idea that if only people were having more children there would be enough money to pay for the elderly is just a joke. There are 3 million unemployed people in Germany (not including those that can't work), they're costing (according to Google) 55 billion a year. Elderly care apparently costs 60 billion a year.

What is that 55bn comprised off? I thought germany linked benefits to what people have paid in?

I’m quite surprised at how self centered some of those answers are.

Like ‘if I can’t have children, can I opt out from laying for maternity care?’
Come on people, it’s not as simple as that.
We are all interconnected at some levels.
The maternity care you dint need? It’s supporting couples who are having children. Those children will be the ones laying your state pension. Would you say it’s fine if they decide to opt out from paying state pension for children free older people because they didn’t pay fir them as newborn/children??
How far would you want to go?

We need to sop looking at taxes in a very short sighted way. Taxes are there to make society better for ALL OF US. You can’t opt in some bits and opt out others because everything is interconnected. Not paying for ‘maternity care’ will mean some people will pay more and this will affect you too (eg resentment towards childless people, less money to be able to buy stuff = less money to make the economy work = less jobs etc etc etc).
And all that for what? £5 a month (and very likeky much much less than that per person). Not even the cost of a take away coffee…,,

That's nice. Cough. The Lebensborn Program. Cough.

Hear hear.

Also, you can bet I won't be entitled to any state funded care anyway.

Yes, couch it as a reward for having children by all means but as it is, it's just made me feel really sad and I'm not even German!

Absolutely disgusting. Not only am I dealing with infertility I now have to pay for the fact I am?!
Meanwhile everyone says people shouldn’t be allowed to have IVF.

What would be better is for governments to understand WHY people aren’t having children when they have a choice not to. Expensive childcare, full time working parents working all hours to then barely see their own children anyway. Women understanding what happens if they’re left as a single parent whilst the man swans off and see his kids once a fortnight.

But no. Let’s financially penalise infertile people.

I’m quite surprised at how self centered some of those answers are.

im not

The money has to come from somewhere to support an aging population. I’d support a higher tax on those without children. Higher than 0.7%.
We need young people and we need money, so something has to give.
Comparing it to paying tax in to cover maternity & childcare elements of society is shortsighted as the young of today are who will be propping up society in the years to come. Having a healthy and educated society is a benefit to everyone in it regardless of whether you created those young people.

Also tax the millionaires and billionaires a hell of a lot more.

What would the rules be though? People
still having to be financially penalised if they didn’t use a sperm donor, egg donor, do a minimum 3 rounds of IVF (pay for it though!) or didn’t wish to adopt? Where would the line be drawn?

It is where tax is concerned. The unpalatable truth is that far too many people contribute far too little financially to the country.

How do you magically produce children when you're infertile?

This would fuck over me and DH - he's infertile, nowt wrong with me. He was a very premature baby and this resulted in his testicles not being made properly nor descending fully before birth - very common - then the NHS fucked it up further by not operating until it was far too late and his testicles were cooked. Not a single functional sperm found across multiple tests.

We are absolutely childless not childfree by choice. Even if we were, where do you draw the line?

Someone who has children who don't want to know them - do they pay more or less than a childless person?

If children die before their parents, how does that impact the maths?

People who do not have capacity to consent to sex but who make it to retirement age - how do you charge them for their care?

Fwiw those wo children should also have more money available for their care in old age.
i seem to remember that raising a child costs about £250k fir the lower estimate, more like £350~400k for MC families (and even more for those who will gift house deposits etc….)

Asking them to pay £30 a month more shouldn’t impact them much…..

This! Another thought to my points already made… so if only one person in the couple is proven infertile is the other one taxed as they didn’t make an effort to find a fertile partner instead??