AfD on finance and taxes

The AfD wants to cut value-added tax on staple foods and baby supplies to zero and to tax energy less. Families would also get relief on municipal fees and charges. The platform regards the higher cost of living as politically caused.

The AfD wants to make life cheaper for families. There should be no more sales tax on basic foods and baby items. Energy should also be taxed less. Families should pay lower fees to their town.

The platform gives diapers as an example of baby supplies. Taxes on energy are to fall because, according to the party, electricity and heating costs put many families under financial pressure. At the municipal level, the AfD wants to work toward lower fees or charges for families.

The AfD wants to lower taxes and levies and simplify tax law. It rejects the carbon levy as ideologically motivated. The standard VAT rate would fall significantly, and a reduced rate would apply to energy and food.

The AfD wants lower taxes. The CO2 tax should go. That is an extra charge on gasoline, oil and gas. The sales tax, called VAT, should drop a lot. For energy and food it should be especially low.

The platform calls reducing the tax and levy burden a core concern. In the AfD's view, today's burden paralyzes economic life and drives companies away. It calls for less state intervention and fewer subsidies and more entrepreneurial freedom. Taxes it sees as ideologically motivated would be abolished, with the CO2 tax as the example.

The AfD wants cash to remain permanently available without restrictions. It rejects a digital euro issued by the European Central Bank because it sees this as a step toward abolishing cash.

The AfD wants to keep cash. Everyone should still be able to pay in cash without limits. The AfD does not want a digital euro. It thinks a digital euro could make cash disappear.

The platform describes cash as an expression of freedom and independence and as a civil liberty. In the AfD's view, purely digital payments would allow complete surveillance of all financial transactions. The party also fears that account holders could then be expropriated very easily. It rejects a digital euro issued centrally by the ECB as a possible gateway to ending cash.

The AfD calls for ending the Staatsleistungen (historic state payments) to the Protestant and Catholic churches, as the Basic Law provides. It sees these payments as a reason for the churches' closeness to governments.

The churches get money from the state every year. This money comes from everyone's taxes. The AfD wants to end these payments. The constitution has called for this for a long time.

Staatsleistungen are payments from general tax revenue that come on top of the church tax and date back to the early 19th century. For 2024, the platform says nearly 30 million euros are budgeted in Thuringia, about ten million more than in 2008. The sums have risen despite falling membership. The AfD demands that the decades-old constitutional mandate to end them be carried out.

The AfD wants to concentrate state money on the state's core tasks and devote a larger share of the budget to investment. In the platform's view, Thuringia does not have a revenue problem but a spending problem, while schools, sports facilities, and roads receive too little funding.

The AfD wants to spend the state's money differently. The state should invest more in schools, roads, and security. Other things should get less money. The AfD says Thuringia spends too much on the wrong things.

The platform puts the investment backlog at about two billion euros for schools and one billion euros for public sports facilities, and says 46 percent of state roads need repair. The size, equipment, and structure of state agencies should follow from a comprehensive review of which tasks the state must perform. For police, schools, tax offices, and courts, the AfD rejects staffing decisions driven only by the state of the budget. The state should handle administrative work itself wherever possible instead of hiring outside consultants. Investment should go to infrastructure, skilled workers, and family-friendly conditions in towns and villages. State spending should also be shown transparently and clearly in the budget.

The AfD wants to end public funding for projects it classifies as ideological, including climate projects, benefits for migrants, and government publicity work. It also wants fewer state-level grant programs so that the administration has less work.

The AfD wants to stop paying for certain projects with tax money. It calls these projects ideological. Examples are climate projects and money for migrants. There should also be fewer grant programs. That should mean less work for government offices.

As areas for savings, the platform names climate projects it considers pointless, what it sees as wrong incentives for migrants, and what it calls state propaganda. As further examples of questionable spending, it cites full medical care for asylum seekers, which it says the law does not require, and what it describes as the indoctrination of children and young people. The number of state grant programs should be reduced to make them clearer and more efficient. The AfD refers to a suggestion by the state audit office and expects staff to be freed up for other tasks.

At the federal level, the AfD supports ending “kalte Progression” (bracket creep) so that effort pays off more in tax terms. State and local taxes that take a great deal of administrative work to collect should be reviewed.

The AfD wants to end bracket creep. This means: a raise that only makes up for inflation can still lead to higher taxes. That should stop. The AfD also wants to check taxes that cause a lot of work in government offices.

Bracket creep means that pay raises which only offset inflation lead to a higher tax burden. The AfD wants to support its abolition at the federal level. State and local taxes should be assessed by how much effort it takes to collect them. The platform names the property tax as an example of a tax with very high administrative costs. It also criticizes high per-capita debt despite rising tax revenue.

The AfD wants a quarter of the state budget to go to municipalities, cities, and counties. The state should also pay in full for the social tasks that counties and independent cities carry out on its behalf.

The AfD wants to give towns and villages more money. A quarter of the state's money should go to them. The state should also pay for tasks it hands to local governments. Then local governments can decide more on their own.

According to the platform, the state and federal governments keep assigning new tasks to local governments without funding them adequately, leading to higher charges and cutbacks for residents. Social benefits such as housing costs under SGB II (the basic income support law), child and youth welfare, and basic income support are said to make up about half of the budgets of counties and independent cities. The AfD demands compliance with the Konnexitätsprinzip (the principle that the level assigning a task must pay for it). It aims to strengthen local self-government and give municipalities financial room to act.

The AfD wants a hardship fund for all property owners who paid more than 1,000 euros in road improvement charges. It should apply retroactively and not only cover cases with deferred or installment payments.

Property owners used to pay when their street was rebuilt. These charges ended in 2019. Some people still got bills afterward for earlier years. The AfD wants a fund to help these people. It should cover everyone who paid more than 1,000 euros.

Road improvement charges were abolished in Thuringia as of January 1, 2019; the AfD credits this largely to its 2018 bill. According to the platform, there is so far no relief for owners who were billed after that date for the years 2015 to 2018. The AfD rejects limiting relief to those whose charges were deferred or paid in installments. Instead, the fund should be open retroactively to everyone whose payment exceeded 1,000 euros.