The traffic light finally promises a new beginning, but can it solve Germany's future problems?
The economist Daniel Stelter has his doubts.
Berlin - SPD, Greens and FDP are currently negotiating a joint traffic light coalition.
The basis for the coalition negotiations, in which the working groups are currently working on the individual subject areas, is the exploratory paper.
There is a lot of talk in it about new beginnings, in general the change of the deadlocked mechanisms after 16 years of Angela Merkel is the mantra of the traffic light parties.
The parties write: “We are committed to progress together.
We are united by the fact that we see opportunities in change. "
Economist Stelter sees in the exploratory paper of the traffic light a "keep it up"
But not everyone recognizes this departure from what has been written down. In an interview with
Focus
, the
top economist Daniel Stelter sees
the exploratory paper as a “courageous keep going”. That is the case with pension policy. There he sees no significant changes. Contribution, level and retirement age should remain the same. And that despite the demographic change, because the population is getting older and older. So fewer people in employment have to finance the pension for more and more people who are going to retire.
"We have to say very clearly that the system as it is now set up is not sustainable," explains Stelter to
Focus
.
"You can not have everything.
We cannot say that we leave everything as it is.
Then there is a hole. ”He does not respond to the fact that the traffic light wants to enter into a partial funding of the statutory pension insurance (share pension).
This model is mainly practiced in Scandinavia.
In Norway, the equity fund to secure pensions, which is fed from the country's oil income, is
one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world
, according to the
Tagesschau
, currently with one trillion dollars.
The expert suggests a higher retirement age - even the traffic light's climate plans do not go far enough for him
For economists, on the other hand, one possibility would be to let the retirement age grow with increasing life expectancy.
“There are suggestions.” Other countries like Denmark would do it that way.
“Work one more year for every three more years of life expectancy.
That wouldn't be so unfair, ”says Stelter.
But not only does he see little progress in terms of pensions, the economist also misses solutions for climate policy.
Too much is talked about switching off for him.
According to Stelter, it is not yet clear where the energy will come from after the end of coal and nuclear power.
The expansion of renewable energies is not making headway and there is also a lack of storage technologies.
Economist Stelter is not very optimistic about the future
However, it must also be said that the exploratory paper is only a rough overview of the plans of the coming government, broken down into twelve pages.
Only at the end of the coalition talks will it be clear what the traffic lights are planning in detail, including in terms of pensions and the climate.
Nevertheless, Stelter is not generally optimistic about the next few years, as the
Focus
writes.
“Depending on the outcome of the election, things could have been worse.
I don't want to give up hope, but it won't be that easy. "
(Md)
