Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) – The Greens state chairman Pascal Haggenmüller shakes the debt brake and calls for an exception for climate protection. “We should reform the debt brake and combine it with an investment rule for climate protection,” Haggenmüller told Ulm’s “Südwest Presse” (Tuesday). “Expenditure on climate protection would then be left out of compliance with the debt brake.” This also makes economic sense. “Every euro invested in climate protection today saves 15 times the follow-up costs.” Haggenmüller worries that, given the negative economic consequences of the Corona crisis and the Ukraine war, there is little money left for climate protection.
The 33-year-old head of the Greens also believes that the federal government must increase the financial scope of the states. “If the world is changing as fundamentally as we are currently experiencing, politicians must find solutions that reflect this turning point. This includes a strong focus on the revenue side of the state.” Above all, Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) is required. “We Greens have shown with the Bundeswehr special fund that we can jump over our shadows. Now others must also show that they have understood what the hour is about,” said Haggenmüller.
The Greens state chairman, who represents the left wing in the top management, suggested: “A solution that could be implemented in the short term would be to close the loopholes in the inheritance tax can contribute.” One could also talk about the wealth tax and the question of how to introduce it without too much bureaucracy. “It’s about the how, not the if.” Here Haggenmüller takes a different position than Finance Minister Danyal Bayaz (Greens), who rejects the reintroduction of the wealth tax because it is too bureaucratic.
