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Finance Minister Lindner (photo from March 2022): the lower energy prices reduce the psychological strain
Photo: Michael Kappeler / dpa
The bill for the Treasury may be smaller than feared: Finance Minister Christian Lindner assumes that Germany will not exhaust the 200 billion euro pot to cushion the high energy prices.
"My expectation is that we won't need the entire protective shield," said the FDP politician at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
The reason is that energy prices are currently not as high as feared.
With the “double boom” worth up to 200 billion euros, the federal government wants to finance price brakes for gas and electricity as well as corporate aid until 2024.
Lindner emphasized that the federal government could not maintain the subsidies indefinitely.
He referred to both the budgetary situation and the risk of government intervention fueling inflation.
The finance minister predicted that inflation would remain high this year.
However, the federal government will probably correct its previous medium-term forecast downwards.
"I expect the inflation rate to drop," said Lindner.
There are already first signs of this.
mic/dpa
