CDU on finance and taxes

The CDU calls for targeted incentives for investment in research, development, and sustainability. Profits kept in the company are to be taxed less, and certain investments are to be written off faster. The party also wants to bring large-scale research institutions to Thuringia.

The CDU wants companies to invest more in research. To help, they should pay less tax on profits they keep in the company. Companies should be able to deduct investments from their taxes faster. Large research centers should come to Thuringia.

The plan includes lower taxes on retained earnings and faster depreciation for investments in research and energy efficiency. The CDU also demands that large-scale research institutions be located in Thuringia. It intends to push for these goals at the federal level as well.

The CDU wants to push at the federal level for VAT on restaurant meals to return permanently to 7 percent. In addition, working hours in tourism are to become more flexible, and a special anti-discrimination rule in Thuringia's restaurant law is to be dropped.

The CDU wants to help restaurants. The tax on meals eaten in restaurants should go back to 7 percent. Working hours in tourism should become more flexible. A special rule against discrimination in the restaurant law should be removed.

According to the program, the lower VAT rate is meant to offset restaurants' disadvantages compared with delivery services, takeout and ready-to-eat food from grocery stores. To allow more freedom in working hours in tourism, the CDU wants to achieve a change to the EU Working Time Directive through the federal government. It wants to delete the special anti-discrimination provision in the Thüringer Gaststättengesetz (state restaurant law) because it considers the rules of the General Equal Treatment Act sufficient.

The CDU wants to lower the real estate transfer tax in Thuringia from 5 to 3.5 percent. At the federal level, it wants states to be allowed to introduce their own exemptions. Families would then no longer have to pay the tax at all.

People who buy a house or land pay a tax. The CDU wants to lower this tax. Later, families should not pay it at all. For that, the federal government must change a law.

Since January 2024, the rate has been 5 percent instead of the previous 6.5 percent, which the CDU presents as its achievement. The next step is to be 3.5 percent. The aim is to support families in buying a home. A full exemption requires tax-free allowances that only federal law can enable so far.

The CDU wants to make the municipal fiscal equalization system (KFA) simpler and more predictable and to favor small municipalities. When the state hands down tasks, it should also pay for them. Municipalities would get more freedom over the local business tax rate and an investment fund.

The state gives money to towns and villages. The CDU wants to change how this money is shared. Small villages should get more. If the state hands over tasks, it should pay for them. Towns should find it easier to lower the business tax. A new fund should give cheap loans for investments.

The weighting scale that determines state transfers would be changed to benefit small municipalities; until then the small-municipalities program continues. Plans include a factor for land area, more weight for towns serving their surrounding region, and a performance incentive under which not all tax revenue is deducted from assessed need. The principle that whoever assigns a task pays for it would be applied, and refugee costs would be fully reimbursed by the federal and state governments. No municipality would be pushed by state law into higher business tax rates. A revolving investment fund would provide subsidized loans and grants, and the repair backlog at schools and kindergartens would be reduced step by step by 2030.

The CDU wants state budgets without new debt and wants to repay crisis-era debt quickly. A budget structure commission is to review the state's tasks, spending and revenue.

The CDU wants no new debt for Thuringia. It wants to pay back debt from the Covid and energy crises quickly. A commission should check what the state spends money on. Unneeded spending should end.

In the platform's view, the previous state government spent more than it took in despite high tax revenue. The CDU announces forward-looking financial planning, dropping dispensable tasks, realistic staff planning and lower costs. The budget structure commission is to conduct an open-ended review and develop guidelines for permanently balanced budgets. Freed-up funds are to go to investments in the future. Projects the party regards as ideological are to receive no money.

The CDU rejects higher taxes and favors tax cuts for citizens, small and mid-sized businesses and industry. Government fees are not to rise for two years.

The CDU does not want higher taxes. It wants to lower taxes. Government fees should stay the same for two years. People and companies should pay less this way.

The platform points to inflation and rising prices: higher taxes would push prices up further, and the state must not add to costs. During the two-year fee moratorium, government fees will not be raised. The CDU also wants to examine where flat fees are possible so that time-consuming valuations are no longer needed.