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Hand out of the grave: Hartz IV doesn't seem to be dead, it's just called differently now
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We remember: Hartz IV was once set in motion by a social democratic Chancellor Schröder, who announced that there was no right to be lazy and that it was better to take any job than not to work;
He received support from a labor minister named Müntefering, who declared with the same kind of social-democratic kindness: "Only those who work should also eat."
With the long-overdue social reform replacing Hartz IV — a 17-year-old zombie whom Merkel dragged from chancellorship to chancellorship (similar to dead Uncle Bernie in “Always Trouble with Bernie”) — the traffic light now wants to stop giving job seekers through to humiliate a Kafkaesque system of sanctions that have hitherto been more severe than some of the consequences of, shall we say, tax evasion.
The most innovative thing about the new citizen money isn't the new label (that's quite unoriginal, because Raider simply became Twix with 50 euros more content, as Markus Feldenkirchen correctly wrote), no, the most innovative thing is the different image of man behind this reform, very delicately shines through - one that doesn't assume the worst in every person.
The core idea of the reform adopted by the Federal Cabinet on Wednesday is to get away from the harsh and condescending attitude that the state has hitherto taken towards those in need of help.
It's about "showing people more respect and respect for the work they've done and treating them as equals," explained Labor Minister Hubertus Heil.
In the first six months in which someone receives support, there will be no cuts in benefits if, for example, applicants do not keep to the appointments at the employment office.
After this so-called "trust period" has expired, there is again the possibility of punishment, i.e. reductions of what is hardly there as a subsistence level anyway.
The idea of disciplining people with a kind of black educational cane bureaucracy to be more diligent by literally rationing their food has always been as anachronistic as it is wrong.
But now we also know: ineffective.
"Since the introduction of Hartz IV 17 years ago, no one has provided scientific evidence for the positive effect of sanctions,"
The survey makes it clear: there is no motivation through negation, the discipline does not help people when looking for work.
Accordingly, Steinhaus explains: »Sanctions do not have the claimed effect.
They almost always create a culture of distrust.
People feel intimidated and stigmatized.«
Intimidation, stigmatization and existential fear - well, if these aren't optimal conditions for organizing one's life and one's own professional future, then I don't know what is.
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From the realization that it is not only wrong, but counterproductive to sanction people into an imagined productivity through punishment, a new perspective opens up: only when circumstances are created in which people can make decisions not out of fear of threats and panic, but with prudence , as far as their professional development is concerned, a meaningful and meaningful work orientation can ideally take place.
Also in the sense of liberal argumentation, everyone should have the opportunity to develop freely, also and especially when it comes to job prospects.
The state does not have to act as an authoritarian father or a naïve nanny here, but rather create undogmatic conditions that enable people to achieve existential autonomy, especially in times of collective or personal crises.
And that is indeed a shift in the perception of the state by citizens who are dependent on social benefits: it is not about demanding and promoting, but about a concession to maturity and personal responsibility.
(Yes, semantically I'm actually winking in the direction of the FDP, which still wants to stick to the sanctions so badly.)
We could at least celebrate this mild revision of the human image as a tiny advance - but now these endeavors have an uncomfortable rendezvous with a new reality.
When the reform was discussed, the response from society and social organizations was benevolent.
However, we are now witnessing an autumn that will be so expensive that even the trees have switched to yellow earlier to save energy.
No matter how you turn the coins: the additional 50 euros are not enough to compensate for inflation.
The study on the effectiveness of Hartz IV also leads to the conclusion that even with a raider that is now called Twix, bitter times are ahead: almost half of the households surveyed are not getting by with the previous Hartz IV payments, it is necessary for example the panels.
It wasn't enough before - and now even less.
Criticism of this criticism comes from business associations, which fear that low earners and job seekers could be played off against each other in society, that the social value of work in general is less appreciated.
If a benefit recipient gets more money from the state than a low-wage earner on the job market, what appeal does a low-income job have?
"With the citizens' income, non-work becomes much more attractive," criticizes Stephan Stracke, the socio-political spokesman for the Union faction.
I don't even want to bother you here with the simple and obvious argument that people simply have to be paid more for their work, especially in view of inflation.
But this fear of groups being played off against each other is otherwise unfounded, because it misinterprets the meaning of citizen income.
It's not about paying people not to work, it's about enabling them to survive so that they can even look for work.
And with this amount, it is still an existence at the precarious minimum, but also on the fringes of society.
"A high proportion of 42 percent of Hartz IV recipients are ashamed of receiving this benefit," describes Jürgen Schupp, labor expert at the Berlin Institute for Economic Research (DIW) in the weekly report of the DIW, "More than half have the feeling that they are not properly entitled to to belong to society.«
And that is perhaps the most important finding: having to draw citizens' income, which is still simply too little, especially during a war and an energy crisis, comes close to social exclusion.
It is perhaps one of the worst punishments for humans as social beings.
Completely abolish the bureaucratic cane, poverty itself is the worst sanction.