this post was submitted on 10 Mar 2025
56 points (98.3% liked)

Europe

4005 readers
2201 users here now

News and information from Europe 🇪🇺

(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)

Rules (2024-08-30)

  1. This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
  2. No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
  3. Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
  4. No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism.
  5. Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
  6. If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
  7. Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in [email protected]. (They're cool, you should subscribe there too!)
  8. Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
  9. No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)

(This list may get expanded when necessary.)

We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.

If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.

If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the mods: @[email protected], @[email protected], or @[email protected].

founded 8 months ago
MODERATORS
 

The Greens are "not available to fund the election promises of the CDU and SPD through debt."

top 22 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 58 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (3 children)

Well the Greens already invited Merz to discuss this topic before the elections and Merz and his CSU cronies denied, and now took the Green's votes for granted w/o even talking to them. So, Merz probably should first learn some basic manners before going into politics.

edit: removed a "probably"

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 days ago

Yeah, if I was Robert Habeck I would be pretty pissed indeed.

[–] I_quote_Seinfeld_a_lot 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

some basic manners before going into politics.

I don't think manners ever mattered for political success. They might even be a hindrance.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

In the US that might be the case, but the German system is set up in a way as to force the different parties to make deals all the time. For that you need a working relationship with the other parties and at best create enough trust, to allow laws to pass at different times. In other words a bit of manners goes a long way. That was what Merkel was great at, which made her survive as long as she did. In the US she would have been dead, as she has very little charisma.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

"election promises of CDU"? lol They're doing the opposite now than what they promised ~~two~~ weeks ago.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Germany needs the investment, so hopefully they can get an agreement.

[–] gigachad 34 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

True, but Merz wants to use this package for agricultural used Diesel, raise tax reliefs for people who commute to work by car and lower taxes for the gastronomy. You see, people in Germany do not really understand how this relates to defense or infrastructure. That is why the Greens do a really good job here and we can hope they pull through.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Maybe get an agreement that debt can only be used for hard infrastructure like rail, electrical grid, etc. and defense spending on weapons and military staffing.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The thing is they only need to borrow money to fund infrasrtucture because there's nothing left after their tax cuts.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

The ZEW (Leibnitz institute for European economic research) calculated how the tax plans of all parties would affect the ordinary budget. The CDU would create a hole of over 100b€ per year. Calculated on 10 years it would be 1tr which is the amount of debt Merz wants to take on.

Source (it is in German tho): https://ftp.zew.de/pub/zew-docs/gutachten/Bundestagswahlprogramme_ZEW_2025.pdf

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Thank you for the source. Just need to use DeepL for translation. Seems like the CDU tax cut is 89 billion euros but I'm not sure if that is every year or over 10 years (which is the standard accounting rule for government budget).

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago

It is 89B € per year in tax cuts. Normal government term is four years...

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago

The CDU seems to be working to fix all the problems that Merkel caused.

RE supporting the auto industry, when you find yourself stuck in a hole, dig deeper.