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This is how retirees are harassed: wave of lawsuits due to double taxation and paragraphs

2021-03-01T21:13:49.530Z


Has the time come for a fundamental reform of the German pension system? More than half a million people have already sued against double taxation.


Has the time come for a fundamental reform of the German pension system?

More than half a million people have already sued against double taxation.

Berlin experts consider the pension taxation, which has been gradually introduced since 2005, to be unconstitutional.

Because the tax relief introduced at the same time on the pension contributions is lower for many than the burden of the pension tax - which consequently means that this is an unconstitutional double taxation.

Double taxation "fraudulent misrepresentation"?

FDP wants to make tax offices responsible

More than half a million people have already sued against this double taxation.

But the state makes it difficult for the plaintiffs - in the opinion of the FDP *: a deliberate harassment.

Its chairman Christian Lindner even wants to campaign with it.

The FDP member of the Bundestag Markus Herbrand is annoyed that tax offices asked pensioners to submit all tax bills from their lives.

He therefore introduced a motion in the Bundestag to reverse the burden of proof: In that case, tax offices and not individual pensioners would have to prove in future that there would be no double taxation of the pension.

Parliament will deal with the request next week.

The Mannheim tax advisor Heinrich Braun even speaks of “fraudulent deception” by the plaintiffs, which in fact undermines legal protection.

"A normal person does not keep his tax assessment notices for 40 years," Braun told the

Frankfurter Rundschau

.

“The tax office doesn't do that either.

For a maximum of 15 to 20 years. ”Braun is therefore suing the Ministry of Olaf Scholz.

Also the president of the social association VdK, Verena Bentele, considers the demand to present the tax bills of the whole life to be an imposition: "It cannot be that those concerned can only get their rights through legal action," Bentele continues.

The VdK demands that the tax authorities check whether there is double taxation at the request of those affected.

+

If you want to take action against double taxation, you must submit all tax assessments from your previous life.

© Sascha Steinach / imago-images

Double taxation for pensioners: hope for fundamental reform

The VdK is waiting impatiently for the decision of the Federal Fiscal Court, which should be made between April and June of this year.

“The ruling will hopefully lead to politicians finally subjecting the taxation of pensions to a fundamental reform.

Pensioners urgently need relief, ”says Bentele.

The Saarbrücken financial mathematician Klaus Schindler is convinced that the previous pension taxation must be overturned: "According to our calculation, double taxation is due at least for pensioners who will retire from 2005," Schindler told

FR *

.

"At this point in time it is still relatively low, but continues to rise rapidly and in the retirement years 2022 to 2023 it reaches its maximum rate of 20 to 23 percent, and unfairly, the higher the greater the number of contribution years." According to Schindler's calculations, the first senior citizens will no longer be taxed twice by 2070.

"For me as a financial mathematician, this construction is adventurous."

The pension system in Germany only works through subsidies.

Pension reform seems unavoidable.

But what exactly should it look like?

A look at Sweden and Norway.

*

fr.de is an offer from the Ippen Digital Network

List of rubric lists: © Sascha Steinach / imago-images

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2021-03-01

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