The influential service sector union Verdi has expressed profound disappointment with the concluding report of the federal-state working group tasked with reforming Germany’s care system. The report, intended to provide a roadmap for long-term stability, has been widely criticized as falling short of meaningful change and perpetuating a fragmented approach to a deepening crisis.
“Many proposals remain vague and imprecise” stated Sylvia Bühler, a Verdi federal board member. “Genuine reforms designed to establish a durable financial foundation for the social care insurance system are conspicuously absent”. Bühler specifically lamented the continued failure to incorporate essential investment and training costs into federal and state budgets, nor to broaden the income streams contributing to the insurance fund. “This confirms what we already knew: we are stuck with piecemeal solutions.
The union argues that a more equitable and sustainable funding model would necessitate including higher incomes, extending contributions beyond traditional wage-based systems to encompass sources such as dividend income and rental revenue. This, they believe, would significantly bolster the insurance fund’s resilience. Instead, the working group reportedly explored options like mandatory private care insurance schemes, a prospect Bühler dismissed as a “neoliberal relic” that places an unfair burden on individuals.
“Risks associated with life, such as the need for care, must be collectively insured” Bühler insisted. Public anxiety regarding the financial burden and inadequate provision of care in the event of needing assistance is high. “What is needed is a fundamental reform, not stopgap measures, to stabilize the care insurance system for the long term.
Verdi is also advocating for capping the individual contributions towards stationary care, known as the “Sockel-Spitze-Tausch” (base-peak exchange), alongside a future evolution of the care insurance system to cover all care-related expenses.
Andreas Storm, head of the DAK health insurance fund, echoed Verdi’s negative assessment. “This exacerbates the existing care crisis” Storm told the “Rheinische Post”. He expressed the expectation that the commission would deliver a blueprint for comprehensive reform, but instead produced “an unbinding collection of all conceivable reform options, without a single concrete proposal for tackling the financial crisis.
Storm concluded starkly: “Today, we are further away from a solution and a sustainable reform of the social care insurance than we were at the time the commission was established last summer. An exit from the financial crisis has become even more unlikely”. The lack of decisive action highlights a widening gap between the urgency of the crisis and the political will to enact transformative change, raising serious concerns about the long-term viability of Germany’s care system.
