Before a crucial meeting at the Federal Chancellery, representatives of the small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector feel marginalized. Christoph Ahlhaus, the Federal CEO of the BVMW SME association, told Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland that the federal government has placed itself under “brutal compulsion” following a bungled, previous gathering at Villa Borsig. He finds it puzzling why the coalition is convening for this legislative session’s most important meeting without including small and medium-sized businesses. Ahlhaus stressed that agreements completely detached from the reality faced by smaller and medium-sized enterprises-such as the failed €1,000 premium-must not happen again.
The BVMW, along with ten other associations, issued a joint statement criticizing Wednesday’s meeting, where Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) plans to discuss upcoming reforms with the leading representatives of trade unions and employer associations. The signatories are monitoring the summit with “growing concern.”
The associations argue that particularly during a period characterized by economic stagnation, stagnant investment, and heightened uncertainty among countless SMEs, Germany requires an open, realistic economic dialogue. They contend that this dialogue should not structurally exclude large segments of the middle-class-oriented economy, noting that the industrial core alone is not representative of the breadth of the German entrepreneurial landscape. Furthermore, many of their core concerns remain unaddressed. According to the eleven associations, these priorities include a noticeable reduction in bureaucracy, reform of the income tax system, and increased flexibility in labor law.
