Volt on the economy

Volt wants to expand regional economic development funding to advance infrastructure and economic growth in a targeted way. Incentives for remote jobs in rural areas and regional start-up centers are meant to keep skilled workers and young companies in the regions.

Volt wants to give more support to the economy in the regions. The state should spend more on roads, networks and businesses there. Companies should get benefits if they offer remote jobs in rural areas. That keeps skilled workers in the region. Young founders should get help in special centers.

The Gemeinschaftsaufgabe Verbesserung der regionalen Wirtschaftsstruktur (GRW), a joint federal and state funding program for regional economic structure, is to receive more money. It is to be used in a targeted way for infrastructure and economic development. Companies are to get incentives to create remote positions in rural areas. Regional start-up centers are to connect young founders and help them build start-ups locally.

Volt wants to reduce the administrative burden on companies. Procedures are to become digital and faster, and EU law is to be transposed without national add-ons. According to the platform, public administration should turn from a disadvantage into an advantage for Germany as a business location.

Volt wants less paperwork for companies. Government offices should work digitally and faster. Companies should write fewer reports about their suppliers. Big building projects should get a permit within three months.

The reporting duties under Germany's supply chain law would be dropped, and its scope and content aligned with the European supply chain directive. A whitelist is planned for countries with comparable law enforcement: there, due diligence duties would apply only when there are concrete signs of violations. On data protection, only the authority at a company's headquarters would be responsible, and the data protection impact assessment would be simplified and standardized at EU level. Permits for industrial plants and infrastructure are to take no more than three months.

Volt wants to give founders better security and make it easier for young companies to get capital. The platform sees new businesses as a source of innovation, jobs, and social and ecological change.

Volt wants to help people who start a company. Self-employed people should have better protection. Young companies should get money from investors more easily. There should be a new kind of company whose assets stay in the company.

Self-employed people would get better protection, state-level founder grants would be expanded, and the threshold for the sales tax exemption would be raised. Tax incentives are meant to draw institutional investors into venture capital for start-ups. Founder networks and incubators would be strengthened, and social start-ups would get more support. A new legal form called Verantwortungseigentum (steward ownership) would be created for companies with locked-in assets.

Volt wants future technologies to be funded jointly through the EU instead of by each member state on its own. This is meant to let Europe keep up with the US and China. Corporate research would get more favorable tax treatment.

Volt wants the EU to fund new technology together. Today each country funds its own companies. This should help Europe keep up with the US and China. Companies should be able to deduct more research costs from their taxes.

The platform names artificial intelligence, hydrogen, biotechnology, and new materials as key technologies. At least 50% of spending on research and development would be tax-deductible. Public research institutions such as universities, the Fraunhofer institutes, or Forschungszentrum Jülich would get start-up centers to support spin-offs. Entrepreneurial culture would be taught as early as school and vocational training, and the state would provide venture capital.

Volt no longer wants gross domestic product to be the sole yardstick for economic performance. New indicators would also capture social and environmental factors, which the party says would give a more realistic picture.

Today the economy is mostly measured with GDP. GDP is the value of all goods and services in a country. Volt wants to develop more measures. They should also show the environment and social matters.

The platform calls for developing additional indicators. These would take social and environmental aspects into account. Volt argues that this would measure the economy's performance more realistically.

Volt wants to clear the investment backlog of recent decades with large-scale investment and to set up an infrastructure fund for this purpose. In the party's view, this secures prosperity, social peace, and the strategic autonomy of Germany and Europe.

Volt wants to put a lot of money into roads, rail, networks and schools. Volt says the state has done too little here for a long time. A new fund should also attract private investors. A fund is a pot of money for a set purpose. Independent bodies should prevent misuse.

Strategic investment would go to areas including digitalization and AI, research, defense and civil protection, renewable energy, power grids and charging points, education and daycare, rail and local transit, and hospitals and rural health care. The fund is meant to attract private capital and new technologies through better framework conditions. Long-term financial planning and independent oversight bodies are meant to ensure efficiency and prevent corruption. The public would be better informed and able to take a financial stake in projects. Less red tape is meant to make citizen-led projects easier and speed up investment.

Volt wants to require manufacturers to make their products durable and recyclable and to introduce a comprehensive right to repair. The aim is a shift to a circular economy so that the use of raw materials no longer rises with economic growth.

Volt wants products to last a long time. People should be able to repair and recycle them. Companies should have to offer spare parts. Independent repair shops should also get spare parts at fair prices. This is how Volt wants to save raw materials.

Companies are to be responsible for the durability and recyclability of their goods and to make spare parts and repair services easy to access. All repair businesses, including independent ones, are to get spare parts at reasonable prices. Funding programs are to support business models such as "product as a service," where customers use a product instead of buying it. Certificates and product passports are to disclose the environmental and social effects of goods and their production. The program justifies this with the Paris climate agreement and the EU's Green Deal.