For exactly nine months, the Grand Coalition has been fighting for its most controversial project. On February 3, Labor Minister Hubertus Heil presented his plan for a basic pension. The problem: The SPD man went beyond what was agreed in the coalition agreement for the pension supplement. Heils project did not provide for means testing and billions in costs - the Union raged.
For weeks now a working group of GroKo broods over the topic. At the weekend, the party leaders of the SPD and CSU spread optimism that an agreement was imminent. But this is not the case: The planned for Monday evening coalition committee in the Chancellery was adjourned. According to information from SPD circles at the request of the Union.
There are still open points, said a CDU spokesman. These should be "carefully clarified" in the coming week. The meeting of the leaders of the Union and the SPD is scheduled to take place on 10th November. One remains confident, said an SPD spokesman.
There does not seem to be a blessing on this coalition, the third alliance of the Union and SPD under Chancellor Angela Merkel. The "New York Times" describes the GroKo these days as a fractious "zombie coalition". Unable to act, but unwilling to die.
In fact, the ruling parties do not currently leave the impression that they are still holding together so much. Except the fear of new elections. The dispute over Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer's Syria push, the SPD's months-long search for a new top and the power struggle in the CDU: all of this hardly contributes to the trustworthy and effective work in the Federal Government.
SPD puts pressure, CDU brakes
The SPD has made the land rent an existential topic of the government. Heils project should actually still in the mid-term review of the coalition, which should be decided in November. If there is no agreement on the basic pension, it will be difficult to convince the party congress in December of a stay in the GroKo, say leading comrades.
The CDU and the CSU have no interest in breaking the Alliance, but they also do not want to be blackmailed. The willingness to accommodate the SPD is kept within narrow limits, especially in the Union faction. The fear: After the congress, the Social Democrats could come up with new demands.
Especially the CDU slows down. For trouble with the Christian Democrats made at the weekend, a report of the "Bild" newspaper. It said that the union was bent and renounced the basic pension on the means test. A devastating impression that the CDU did not want to put off. Jens Spahn, Minister of Health and member of the working group, disagreed, described the report on Twitter as false and provided conditions for an agreement. SPD leader SPD interim boss Malu Dreyer moved to the Funke media group. And already the tedious rapprochement is over again.
Nobody wants to be a loser
In the SPD, many are concerned about how differently the EU politicians position themselves. It is said that most members of the working group have a desire to reach an agreement, according to SPD circles. One is already relatively advanced in the matter. Thus, the cost of the basic pension should be less than two billion euros per year. In Heils first draft still 3.8 billion euros were provided annually. For the SPD it is crucial that about 1.5 million people profit from the basic pension - ten times more than in the variant of the coalition agreement.
But the sticking point is still the concept of means testing. The working group has been talking for some time about an income test that could run through the tax offices. But the Union apparently fears being a loser in a compromise. FDP and employers' associations warned again on the weekend again urgently before the plans.
Nevertheless, as has been the case for months, the SPD continues to convey confidence that agreement could be reached. Then next Sunday.
Incidentally, the coalition wants to pull its balance, even now, without agreement on the basic pension. On Wednesday, the half-time check to the Cabinet, it said from SPD circles. That could not wait any longer.
You want to answer the Sunday question for the covenant? Vote here:
How does the Civey method work?
The opinion research institute Civey works with a multi-level fully automated procedure. All representative real-time surveys are played in a Germany-wide network of more than 20,000 websites ("Riversampling"), so it is not only users of SPIEGEL ONLINE interviewed. Anyone can participate in the surveys online and will be included in the representative result with their answers if they have registered. From these users, Civey draws a quoted sample that ensures that it matches the population, for example, in terms of age, gender and population density. Finally, in a third step, the results are weighted by other attendees' socio-demographic factors and attitudes to correct distortions and prevent manipulation. More information can be found in the Civey FAQ.
Why is a registration necessary?
The registration helps to weigh the answers, thus allowing a result for the surveys, which is representative of the voting population in Germany. Each participant is asked for their gender, year of birth and place of residence. After that everyone can give their opinion in further surveys on different topics.
How do the results become representative?
The answer of each participant is weighted so that the result of a survey is representative of the population. For the Sunday question and the government monitor, this population comprises the population entitled to vote in Germany. The weighting is done fully automatically on the basis of the personal details at the registration as well as the history of earlier answers of a user. More methodological details can be found in the Civey whitepaper.
Will you reach enough participants online?
Opinion polls are usually conducted by phone or online. The significance of the results depends on how many people can be reached and how many actually participate in a survey when they are approached. Internet connections and landline connections are currently about equally widespread in Germany - with about 90 percent of households, mobile phones even 95 percent. The willingness to participate in all methods in the single-digit percentage range, especially experts estimate it for telephone surveys.
Thus, in both methods there is a group of people that can not be reached because they either have no connection to the respective network or do not want to participate in the survey. Therefore, a significant number of people must always be approached for a meaningful result. Civey surveys are currently in addition to SPIEGEL ONLINE in more than 20,000 other websites involved, including various media. This ensures that as many populations as possible can be reached.
How do I recognize the quality of a result?
Until the result of a survey becomes representative, enough different people have to participate. Whether this is already successful, makes Civey transparent, in that for each survey result a statistical error probability is specified. The number of participants and the interview time are also published for each survey.
What does it mean when the colored areas in the graphics overlap?
In our graphs, the statistical error is shown as a colored interval. This interval shows the uncertainty associated with a poll score. For example, on the Sunday question, one can not say exactly how many percent a party would get in a poll, but specify an interval where the outcome is likely to be. If the intervals of two survey values overlap, then strictly speaking no statements about the difference can be made. For the Sunday question this means: If the poll numbers of two parties are so close together that overlap their error intervals, it can not be deduced from which would currently perform better in the election.
What happens with my data?
The personal data of the users are stored encrypted on German servers and remain secret. Civey employees use only user IDs for reporting and can not associate users with their votes. The main purpose of the users' personal information is to weigh the answers and to ensure that the surveys are not manipulated. To prevent this, Civey uses both statistical and technical methods. In addition, Civey works with external partners who create audiences. Only when users have accepted the privacy policy of both Civey and an external partner, may your responses be used by the Partner to model those audiences. However, a partner does not receive information about your political and religious attitudes as well as those with which you can be identified. Civey users are also not ads based on their answers. You may object to the distribution to partners at any time here as a logged in user. More information about privacy at Civey can be found here.
Who is behind Civey surveys?
At this point, readers in the app and on the mobile / stationary website have the opportunity to participate in a representative Civey survey. Civey is an online opinion research institute based in Berlin. To compile its representative surveys, the software of the company, founded in 2015, merges websites into a nationwide survey network. In addition to SPIEGEL ONLINE include, among other things, the "Tagesspiegel", "World", "Wirtschaftswoche" and "Rheinische Post". Civey was funded by the ProFit funding program of Investitionsbank Berlin and the European Regional Development Fund.
