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Shopping in the supermarket: People with low incomes in particular save on groceries
Photo: Sven Hoppe / dpa
In recent months, inflation has continued to climb - and in doing so has pushed many people to the edge of their financial means.
Across all income groups, 39 percent of people in Germany who are employed or looking for work want to buy less food and beverages in the future.
One in ten even plans to buy “significantly less”.
This was the result of a survey by the union-affiliated Hans Böckler Foundation.
6200 people were interviewed for the representative survey.
Even more respondents want to save on clothing and shoes, even more than half said so (53 percent).
About the same number plan to eat and drink less often in pubs and restaurants.
More than two-thirds of those surveyed stated that they wanted to reduce electricity and fuel consumption.
And more than 60 percent of those surveyed also want to save on heating their homes and hot water.
People with low incomes have to do without much more often
Although the numbers are high across all income groups, there are clear differences: among the employed with a low household income of up to 2,000 euros net per month, more than every second person stated that they were able to buy less food.
Almost two-thirds now plan to spend less money on clothes and shoes.
Sebastian Dullien, the scientific director of the Institute for Macroeconomics and Business Cycle Research (IMK) of the Böckler Foundation, calls for future aid packages from the federal government to have a stronger social focus than before.
Measures must be designed in such a way "that households with low incomes are relieved noticeably more than those with higher incomes".
Previous measures, such as the traffic light coalition's fuel price brake, are considered to be relief according to the "watering can principle" because they use taxpayers' money regardless of income.
In the case of the fuel price brake, said the “economic wise man” Veronika Grimm in May, it is primarily the high earners who benefit, “because they own more cars and drive longer distances.” The energy cost flat rate of 300 euros, on the other hand, is at least partially adjusted to income because it is taxed as such must become.
If you have a higher income, you have to give back more of the payment.
However, many people with low incomes, such as pensioners or students, have so far been excluded from the flat rate.
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Subsidies for petrol and diesel: the tank discount is a German self-deception A comment by Claus Hecking
The Federal Statistical Office intends to publish an initial estimate on Wednesday afternoon of how inflation developed in Germany in June.
In May, sharp rises in energy and food prices pushed the inflation rate to its highest level in almost 50 years.
Consumer prices were 7.9 percent above the level of the same month last year.
jlk/dpa