Linke on finance and taxes

The Left wants to launch a Bundesrat initiative to bring back the wealth tax and to reform the inheritance and gift tax. Large fortunes are to contribute more to funding public tasks. The party aims to reduce inequality and raise money for municipalities and social infrastructure.

The Left wants a tax on large fortunes. People who own more than one million euros should pay one percent in tax. Large inheritances should also be taxed more. The money should help towns, cities and social services.

The plan is a rate of one percent on wealth above one million euros. By the program's calculation, this would bring Saxony-Anhalt up to 2.0 billion euros a year. Because the tax is a federal matter, the state is to start an initiative in the Bundesrat, the chamber of the states. For the inheritance and gift tax, the party wants contributions that reduce the concentration of wealth. It also justifies the demands with the economic losses people in the state suffered after the Treuhand privatization era.

The Left wants to develop the Gewerbesteuer (local trade tax) into a municipal business tax that covers all income from self-employment. A uniform allowance of 24,500 euros is meant to protect small businesses. The party aims to strengthen municipal revenue and treat different forms of work equally.

Businesses today pay a trade tax to their town. Some self-employed people do not pay this tax. The Left wants to change that. All self-employed people should pay the new tax. Nobody should pay on the first 24,500 euros. This way, towns should get more money.

According to the program, today's trade tax covers only part of self-employed activity. Many solo self-employed people and small service providers are said to be left out. The program says this leads to unequal burdens between forms of work and weakens municipal finances. The allowance of 24,500 euros is to apply equally to everyone and keep paperwork low.

The Left wants to reshape the state's investment bank so that capital is steered democratically and directed into sustainable future projects. A regional investment fund is to give local actors a stake in the economy. The party considers investment in education, social infrastructure and climate protection worthwhile even when financed by borrowing.

The Left wants to change the state's investment bank. Citizens, towns and businesses should decide together about the money. A new fund should give local people a share in companies. The state should also be allowed to take on debt. The party wants to use the money for education, social services and climate protection.

Representatives of business, citizens and municipalities are to decide on investment funds as equal partners so that major decisions are legitimized transparently. The regional investment fund is meant to tie companies more closely to their location, strengthen workers' say and allow returns to flow into local participation projects. Support is to go to projects that secure jobs and value creation in the long term and benefit the environment and education. Despite higher interest rates, the program favors borrowing for investment, combined with risk and cost assessment and long-term repayment planning. The party opposes a policy of austerity and cuts and wants to act countercyclically.

The Left wants a state program for investment in climate protection, education, health care, and social participation. It accepts higher debt in the short term, which the party says will be offset later by tax changes and a stronger domestic economy.

The Left wants a big investment program. The money should go to schools, health care, and climate protection. The state would take on more debt at first. The party says this will balance out later.

The program would provide more money for daycare centers, schools, universities, and continuing education. Nursing and health care services would be expanded, as would services for children, young people, and seniors. It also covers spending on renewable energy, energy-efficient renovation, sustainable mobility, sustainable construction, and more urban green space. According to the party, the initially higher debt would be offset in the long run by its tax policy and by support for the domestic economy.

The Left rejects any sale of public property without exception and wants to bring key infrastructure back under municipal ownership. It rules out cuts to social and environmental spending as well as job cuts in the public sector.

The Left does not want to sell public property. Important facilities should belong to towns and cities again. The party does not want to cut social or environmental spending. No public service jobs should be lost.

The party makes the rejection of privatization the foundation of its fiscal policy. It wants to actively push for strategically important infrastructure to be remunicipalized, meaning returned to public ownership. It also rules out cuts in social and environmental areas, any dismantling of public infrastructure, and staff reductions in the public sector.

The Left wants to replace the large number of separate grant programs with a lump-sum allocation to municipalities. Municipalities are to decide for themselves how to use the money because, in the party's view, they know best what is needed locally.

Today towns must file separate applications for many projects. The Left wants to change that. Towns should get a fixed amount of money. They then decide themselves how to use it. Poor towns should get more.

The lump sum is to be distributed by fixed, objective criteria. Population is the basis; added to this are financial strength, with financially weak municipalities receiving more, as well as area and settlement structure. Social and demographic features such as the share of older people and children or the unemployment rate are also to count, as are special burdens from structural change or climate impacts. The program criticizes current funding practice as rigid and expects less bureaucracy, more planning certainty and a balancing of structural differences.

The Left wants to redistribute money in favor of towns and cities and adapt the municipal fiscal equalization system to their tasks. The federal government and the state are to pay in full for tasks they hand down to municipalities.

The Left wants towns and cities to get more money. The federal government and the state give towns many tasks. They should then pay for these tasks in full. The money from the state should grow along with costs.

According to the program, the state balances its budget partly at the municipalities' expense by underfunding fiscal equalization, for example in the core allocations. As a result, levies charged by counties and municipal associations burden member municipalities, which are increasingly suing successfully against them. Inflation, wage agreements and energy prices have shrunk municipalities' room for maneuver in real terms, the program says. The party wants to make fiscal equalization more dynamic and thereby secure investment in structurally weak regions. Without redistribution, it argues, the gap between rich cities and poor municipalities widens.

The Left calls for a debt cut for municipalities at the federal level. It says the old debts arose because municipalities had to carry out mandatory tasks without enough money; the party sees the responsibility with the federal government and the states.

Many towns have old debts. The Left wants the federal government to cancel these debts. The Left says the towns are not to blame for them. Without the debts, towns can build and repair more again.

The program calls municipal debt a system failure rather than the result of mismanagement. Repayment ties up a large part of the running budget in many municipalities and burdens future generations, it says. A debt cut is meant to allow investment in infrastructure, social housing, the economy and staff, and to bring living conditions closer together. It is also meant to keep municipalities from selling housing, public utilities or land under financial pressure, so that basic public services stay in public hands.