Enlarge image
Photo: Britta Pedersen / dpa
Under the Merkel government, the black zero has prevailed for years.
The traffic light did not want to continue this type of budgetary policy - but Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner did want to save.
The FDP leader has now defended the high debt since he took office a good year ago.
'I'm certainly not proud that we're in debt at the moment.
But we are in an energy war that requires special responses," he said in an interview published today in his ministry's monthly report.
»We have to finance the electricity and gas price brake to protect people and companies from being overwhelmed.«
Lindner did not want to touch the debt brake.
But since the liberals took over the finance ministry, the debt has totaled around 500 billion euros - of which 200 billion are distributed among special funds alone as a defense against high energy prices and 100 billion for the modernization of the Bundeswehr.
According to the FDP chairman, the government must react decisively to the consequences of the war in Ukraine.
This is the only way to preserve the economic substance.
"Otherwise, the long-term economic damage to our country would be greater than the burden of the current debt."
However, the aim must now be to return to a permanently stable financial policy.
“If the exit from these crisis measures succeeds, then we will see a significant reduction in general government debt by the end of this decade and the beginning of the next.
It's billions - but measured against an economy that will soon be four trillion euros, these are still viable loans if we don't take them out on a permanent basis, but only during the crisis.«
mrc/Reuters
