Emigration tax

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The emigration tax , also known as the passport levy in Austria , was a compulsory levy that was graded according to wealth and was levied from August 1938 on " Jews willing to emigrate " in Austria and from 1939 also in the "Altreich" .

Passport levy in Austria

In Austria, the emigration tax was collected as a so-called “passport levy” from the Central Office for Jewish Emigration in Vienna . Its height was set by the Israelite Community and the "Gildemeester Aid Office" , which worked for "non-believing Jews".

The cash assets remaining after deduction of all taxes including the Jewish property tax , liabilities and necessary emigration costs were used as the assessment basis . As a result, over 8.3 million Reichsmarks were raised in Austria from 1938 to 1941 . Around half of the Jews forced to leave the country remained exempt from the passport levy, as they had less than one thousand Reichsmarks left. Destitute Jews received travel allowances from the funds collected through the passport levy, which averaged 122 Reichsmarks.

Emigration tax in the "Altreich"

It can be assumed that the Viennese “passport levy” was the model for the emigrant tax in the Altreich. Most historians see Reinhard Heydrich and his colleagues as the driving force to introduce a corresponding tax in the old Reich.

In a circular from the Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland (Reich Association of Jews in Germany) dated February 25, 1939, graded rates of assessment of an emigration tax between one and ten percent were mentioned for assets above 1000 Reichsmarks. In contrast to the Austrian passport tax, the tax was not only set by the Reichsvereinigung, but also collected by it or its branches. The passport was only issued by the authorities if a corresponding certificate was available.

In April 1940, the Reichsvereinigung was instructed by the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA) to retroactively claim the tax from those emigrants who had emigrated before this special tax was introduced. If you could not fall back on credit in Sperrmark accounts, relatives were called in to pay.

The Reichsvereinigung financed its tasks such as promoting emigration, social welfare and education from the funds collected through membership fees and taxes. Income and expenses were checked by the supervisory authority through Walter Jagusch or his successor Fritz Woehrn in the RSHA and required their approval. A budget for the years 1940 to 1942 estimated expenditure of 125 million Reichsmarks; 71 million of this should be covered by future or retrospective emigration taxes.

Interpretations

Esriel Hildesheimer opposes the portrayal of Hans Günther Adler and Raul Hilberg that the authorities had constantly robbed the Reichsvereinigung of all of the funds available to them. Hildesheimer takes the view that the Reichsvereinigung was allowed to collect the emigration tax independently and that the incoming funds could actually be used to fulfill all of its tasks.

Other historians judge cautiously in their assessment of the compulsory levy, which has had both positive and negative effects. Almost 70,000 of the Jewish emigrants from the “Old Reich” had assets of less than 1,000 Reichsmarks and many of the almost unfavorable Jews were dependent on advice and support from the Reich Association. On the one hand, funds from the compulsory levy promoted the emigration of impoverished Jews and ultimately made their rescue possible; on the other hand, this was financed by an additional plundering of wealthy Jews.

See also

Web links

  • Document 20: Emigration tax Confidential express letter from the Reich Minister of the Interior concerning "Emigration" of Jews, February 25, 1939

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Gabriele Anderl; Dirk Rupnow; Alexandra-Eileen Wenck; Historians' Commission of the Republic of Austria .: The Central Office for Jewish Emigration as a Robbery Institution , Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-486-56784-7 , pp. 251f.
  2. ^ Gabriele Anderl; Dirk Rupnow; Alexandra-Eileen Wenck: The Central Office for Jewish Emigration ... , Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-486-56784-7 , p. 252.
  3. ^ Theodor Venus, Alexandra-Eileen Wenck: The deprivation of Jewish assets as part of the Gildemeester campaign. An empirical study on the organization, form and change of "Aryanization" and Jewish emigration in Austria 1938–1941 Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-7029-0496-4 , p. 172.
  4. ^ Gabriele Anderl; Dirk Rupnow; Alexandra-Eileen Wenck: The Central Office for Jewish Emigration ... , Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-486-56784-7 , p. 254. Document 1816-PS in: IMT: The Nuremberg Trial of the Major War Criminals . Reprint Munich 1989, ISBN 3-7735-2522-2 , Volume XXVIII, p. 533 / Document VEJ 2/146 in: Susanne Heim (Ed.): The persecution and murder of European Jews by National Socialist Germany 1933-1945 (source collection ) Volume 2: German Reich 1938 - August 1939 , Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-486-58523-0 , pp. 408–437.
  5. ^ Gabriele Anderl; Dirk Rupnow; Alexandra-Eileen Wenck: The Central Office for Jewish Emigration ... , Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-486-56784-7 , p. 255.
  6. Bernhard Müller: Everyday life in a civilization break. The exceptional injustice against the Jewish population in Germany 1933-1945 (Diss.) Munich 2003, ISBN 3-935877-68-4 , p. 560.
  7. Beate Meyer: Tödliche Gratwanderung - the Reich Association of Jews in Germany between Hope, Coercion, Self-Assertion and Entanglement (1939-1945) , Göttingen 2011, ISBN 978-3-8353-0933-3 , p. 111.
  8. Esriel Hildesheimer: Jewish self-administration under the Nazi regime , Tübingen 1994, ISBN 3-16-146179-7 , p. 96f.
  9. ^ Gabriele Anderl; Dirk Rupnow; Alexandra-Eileen Wenck; Historians' Commission of the Republic of Austria .: The Central Office for Jewish Emigration as a Robbery Institution , Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-486-56784-7 , p. 256.
  10. So in the context of "Aktion Gildemeester" in: Theodor Venus, Alexandra-Eileen Wenck: The deprivation of Jewish assets as part of the Gildemeester campaign. An empirical study on the organization, form and change of "Aryanization" and Jewish emigration in Austria 1938-1941 , Munich 2004, ISBN 3-7029-0496-4 , p. 527.