AfD on the economy

The AfD demands immediate state payments for businesses that suffered losses from COVID measures. For future restrictions, income protection and full compensation should be set up from the start, especially for small businesses and the self-employed.

Many businesses lost money during COVID. The AfD wants the state to pay for these losses. This should apply above all to small businesses. If there are new restrictions, help should come right away.

The program regards closures and access limits for unvaccinated people as an interference with the freedom to run a business that has not yet been compensated. The AfD rejects large aid payments to foreign corporations that pay hardly any taxes in Germany. It also calls for targeted taxation of such corporations and tax relief for regional businesses. It criticizes Lower Saxony's aid as deficient and points to Bavaria as a model.

The AfD wants Lower Saxony to keep its full stake in the VW/Porsche group. It justifies this with the importance of large industrial companies for jobs in the state.

The state of Lower Saxony owns part of Volkswagen. The AfD wants this to stay that way. The state should not sell any shares. The AfD says the big companies secure many jobs.

According to the program, more than ten percent of the roughly 4.8 million employees in Lower Saxony work in large industrial companies, and many more at suppliers. The AfD commits to these companies. It also wants to upgrade applied research, improve cooperation between universities and business, and create an investment-friendly environment for manufacturing. Public funding should be awarded based on economic benefit.

The AfD wants to reorganize the chambers of commerce and industry and the chambers of crafts. Official tasks such as training and expert certification would stay with levy-funded chambers, while lobbying and services would become voluntary.

Today, businesses must be members of a chamber. The AfD wants to change that. The chambers should still set rules for job training. For other chamber services, membership should be voluntary. Then only those who want to join will pay.

Levy-funded chambers would continue to set requirements for vocational training and further education, for expert assessors and, for example, for permits in road transport. The level of requirements is not to be lowered. For lobbying and services, membership and fees would be voluntary.

The AfD wants to attract companies and founders to rural areas with incentives and to make broadband expansion a top priority. The state should do more to promote tourism, which the party says should take precedence over wind and solar installations.

The AfD wants more jobs in the countryside. Companies should get benefits when they move there. Fast internet should reach everywhere quickly. The state should do more for tourism in Lower Saxony. Tourism should matter more than wind turbines and solar plants.

The incentives are meant especially for digital work; fast internet should also allow working from home and so help people combine family and career. More businesses in rural areas are supposed to slow the move to cities and give young people prospects. The AfD sees room for growth in tourism, above all among visitors from abroad. As examples it names small rest stops along bike paths selling regional dairy products, and farm vacations as extra income for farms. In the party's view, wind and solar installations reduce the value of the landscape.