Care allowance

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The care allowance was a social benefit for families in Germany who look after their children in the second and third year of life without using public services such as day- care centers .

The care allowance was introduced by the law on the introduction of a care allowance (Betreuungsgeldgesetz) on August 1, 2013. On July 21, 2015, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the regulation violated the Basic Law and was null and void due to the lack of legislative competence of the federal government . Prime Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) then announced on the same day that the care allowance in Bavaria would be retained as a state benefit.

There is also childcare allowance in Finland, Norway and Sweden.

Germany (out of date)

Legal basis, amount, jurisdiction

The legal basis for the care allowance is regulated in section 2 of the Federal Parental Allowance and Parental Leave Act (BEEG), according to which care allowances are granted for each child born on August 1, 2012 or later from the beginning of the 15th month to the end of the 36th month of life can; since August 1, 2014, it has been EUR 150 per month, and if withdrawn before August 1, 2014, EUR 100 per month ( Section 27  (3) sentence 2 BEEG). A withdrawal before the 15th month of life is only permitted if there is no longer any entitlement to parental allowance , whereby the total care allowance per child is not paid for longer than 22 months. The care allowance offices designated by the state governments are responsible for granting care allowance. These are very different institutions depending on the state - while the L-Bank takes on this function in Baden-Württemberg , in Berlin it is the district (quasi-communal) youth welfare offices or in North Rhine-Westphalia the family funds .

Relationship to other social benefits

The care allowance is only offset against unemployment benefit I and the Federal Training Assistance Act (BAföG) if it exceeds EUR 300, i.e. if care allowance is received for at least four children at the same time, and from August 1, 2014 for at least three children. This means that the Bafög and ALG I benefits are only reduced accordingly if the childcare allowance exceeds EUR 300. The care allowance is credited in full to the unemployment benefit II ("Hartz IV"), that is, it is deducted from the ALG II. Parents who receive ALG II may only use it indirectly for old-age provision or for educational savings, whereby the total assets may not exceed EUR 200 per year of life. In fact, there is no childcare allowance for most parents who receive ALG II. Nevertheless, the job centers ask these parents to apply for childcare allowance, as ALG II is subordinate to other social benefits. However, they then no longer have to take part in the integration measures of the job center. It is not possible to receive parental allowance at the same time .

Payout statistics

In the third quarter of 2014, childcare allowance was paid for 317,219 children. This is a significant increase compared to the previous quarters. In the first quarter of 2014, for example, childcare allowance was paid for around 146,000 and in the second quarter for around 224,400 children.

94.7% of the recipients are women.

costs

In the 2015 federal budget , the care allowance is estimated at 900 million euros .

criticism

In 2012, three committees of the Federal Council (women and youth, family and senior citizens, finance) recommended that the Federal Council convene the mediation committee, because in their opinion the childcare allowance keeps children away from the educational offerings of the day-care centers and consolidates outdated role models about the division of family and gainful employment. Last but not least, the care allowance is wrong from a financial and economic point of view. International experience has shown that such services tend to lead to a decline in the labor force participation of mothers and in the use of early childhood education and care facilities.

It is also criticized that the care allowance reduces the incentive to work, especially for mothers with a working partner. This leads to either the employment rate or the volume of work falling. According to Spieß, a short-term loss of income can be compensated with the care allowance, but medium to long-term wage effects associated with a reduction in gainful employment cannot.

Another point of criticism concerns children from migrant families. These are increasingly cared for at home, which makes it difficult for the children to integrate and learn German.

Critics called the care allowance stove premium because, in the opinion of the critics, "[...] it discourages mothers from working and thus promotes an antiquated family image."

Norm control

The Federal Constitutional Court dealt in 2015 after a application for judicial review of Hamburg with the constitutionality of the care allowance. Hamburg saw its efforts to bring as many children as possible to publicly funded childcare facilities as early as the age of one, counteracted by the incentive of the childcare allowance and complained that the federal government lacked the legislative competence for the introduction of the childcare allowance , as this was neither a benefit public welfare was still to harmonize living conditions. The law also violates the equal treatment of men and women as well as Article 6 of the Basic Law , especially since those who only give their child to a state-subsidized daycare center for one hour per week lose their entitlement to the care allowance.

With a judgment of July 21, 2015 (Az .: 1 BvF 2/13), the Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the childcare allowance violated the Basic Law due to the lack of the federal government's legislative competence. The court stated that although the introduction of the care allowance was to be assigned to the area of ​​public welfare within the meaning of Article 74.1 No. 7 of the Basic Law, the requirements of Article 72.2 of the Basic Law were not met. According to this regulation, the federal government only has legislative competence if the creation of equivalent living conditions in the federal territory or the preservation of legal or economic unity in the national interest makes federal regulation necessary. The provisions on a nationwide care allowance did not meet these requirements.

Finland, Norway and Sweden

The care allowance was introduced in Finland in 1985, Norway in 1998 and Sweden in 2008. The care allowance is paid out in full or in part in the three countries if the state care offer is not used or only partially used. In Finland and Sweden, children have a legal right to state childcare. In contrast, in Norway access to good government care facilities is not guaranteed. The childcare allowance is not only valid for home care by the parents, but can also be used for private childcare offers.

The amount of childcare allowance in the three countries is around 10% of average income, i.e. around 330 euros per month in Finland, 3,300 to 5,000 NOK in Norway and 3,000 SEK in Sweden. In Finland there are also allowances for the child in care and an additional payment for each sibling.

Families in Finland who have a child under the age of three who are not cared for in a public institution are eligible. In Norway, since August 1, 2012, childcare allowance has only been paid for one-year-old children (between 13 and 23 months) who do not go to public care facilities. In Sweden, parents with children between the ages of one and three who are not or partially cared for by the state receive full or partial childcare allowance.

In Finland in 2007 childcare allowance was paid to 52% of children between nine months and three years of age, compared with 57% in 1998. In Norway, the proportion of families who have made use of childcare allowance has fallen sharply since its introduction: in 2011, 25% of all parents of one to two-year-old children received childcare allowance, compared with 75% in 1999. In Sweden, 4.7% of the eligible parents in the paying municipalities received childcare allowance in 2011. This corresponds to 2.5% of all parents of one to two year old children.

The vast majority of benefit recipients are mothers - 84% in Norway to 92% in Sweden - especially mothers with low incomes and low levels of education.

Studies from Finland and Norway show that childcare allowance is linked to a stronger gender-specific division of labor in childcare and traditional gender roles . In Sweden, the income gap between women and men has widened further in the course of the introduction of the childcare allowance, because it is predominantly women who take advantage of the childcare allowance and reduce their work and thus their income.

In Norway, during the first four years after the introduction of the childcare allowance, there was a significant decline in the labor market participation of mothers. The care allowance increases the relative cost of state childcare and creates incentives for women to stay at home. In Norway and Sweden, the care allowance has had a particularly negative impact on the labor market participation of mothers with a migrant background. In Finland, the additional municipal benefits in addition to the childcare allowance lead to a further decrease in the employment rate of mothers.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Law on the introduction of a care allowance (Care Allowance Act)
  2. ^ Federal Constitutional Court: Karlsruhe tips the care allowance. In: Zeit Online. July 21, 2015, accessed July 21, 2015 .
  3. ↑ Christina Boll and Nora Reich: Das Betreuungsgeld: A critical economic analysis (PDF; 232 kB). In: Economic Service . 92, No. 2, February 2012, pp. 121-128. doi : 10.1007 / s10273-012-1338-7 .
  4. ↑ care allowance offices of the federal states . Federal Ministry for Family, Seniors, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ). July 31, 2013. Archived from the original on August 30, 2013. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved September 3, 2013. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.bmfsfj.de
  5. ↑ http://www.hartziv.org/news/20131021-jobcenter-draengen-hartz-iv-muetter-zum-betreuungsgeld.html
  6. ↑ Controversial social benefit: Almost 400,000 families receive childcare allowance. In: Spiegel Online. April 12, 2015, accessed April 13, 2015 .
  7. ↑ More and more popular in Germany. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung . April 15, 2015, accessed April 16, 2015 .
  8. ↑ BR-Drs. 697/1/12
  9. ↑ Christa Katharina Spieß : Childcare allowance contradicts the goals of sustainable family policy (PDF; 229 kB). In: DIW weekly report . 79, No. 24, 2012, p. 24.
  10. ^ Jan Schneider: Integration expert: childcare allowance prevents migrant children from attending daycare. Deutschlandradio Kultur , July 31, 2013, accessed on December 18, 2014 .
  11. ↑ Xaver Bitz: Seehofer is a success factor? That became of his promises. Münchner Merkur , November 21, 2016, accessed November 30, 2016 .
  12. ↑ Max Haerder: Myth stove premium. Wirtschaftswoche , January 11, 2016, accessed November 30, 2016 .
  13. ↑ Constitutional judges tip childcare allowance. Der Spiegel , July 21, 2015, accessed November 30, 2016 .
  14. ^ Dietmar Hipp: care allowance before the constitutional court: juristically failed. In: Spiegel online. April 14, 2015, accessed April 14, 2014 .
  15. ↑ Lisa Caspari: Federal Constitutional Court: How fair is the care allowance? Die Zeit, April 14, 2014, accessed on April 14, 2014 .
  16. ^ Frank Leth: Hamburg complains: Federal Constitutional Court is examining childcare allowance. Hamburger Abendblatt, April 13, 2015, accessed on April 15, 2015 .
  17. ↑ Federal Constitutional Court : Judgment of July 21, 2015 - 1 BvF 2/13. July 21, 2015, accessed July 21, 2015 .
  18. ↑ Handelsblatt of July 21, 2015: Karlsruhe judges tip care allowance [1]
  19. ↑ No legislative competence of the federal government for the care allowance. Federal Constitutional Court, July 21, 2015, accessed on July 21, 2015 .
  20. ^ Marion Bacher: Human children. (No longer available online.) In: Fluter. Magazine of the Federal Agency for Civic Education 49th BzPB , 2013, p. 49 , archived from the original on May 15, 2015 ; Retrieved April 21, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.fluter.de
  21. ↑ a b c d e f g Anne Lise Ellingsæter: Care allowance: Experiences from Finland, Norway and Sweden ( Memento of the original from October 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 184 kB). International Policy Analysis, Friedrich Ebert Foundation, April 2012. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.frauenrat.de
  22. ↑ Katja Repo: Finnish child home care allowance - users' perspectives and perceptions . In: Jorma Sipilä, Katja Repo and Tapio Rissanen (eds.): Cash-for-Childcare. The Consequences for Caring Mothers . Edward Elgar, Cheltenham 2010, ISBN 978-1-84980-423-3 , pp. 46-64 .
  23. ↑ Marit Rønsen and Ragni Hege Kitterød: Cash-for-care in Norway: take-up, impact and consequences . In: Jorma Sipilä, Katja Repo and Tapio Rissanen (eds.): Cash-for-Childcare. The Consequences for Caring Mothers . Edward Elgar, Cheltenham 2010, ISBN 978-1-84980-423-3 , pp. 89-108 .
  24. ^ Marit Rønsen: Long-term Effects of Cash for Childcare on Mothers' Labor Supply . In: Labor . 23, No. 3, September 2009, pp. 507-533. doi : 10.1111 / j.1467-9914.2009.00456.x .
  25. ↑ a b Inés Hardoy and Pål Schøne: Incentives to work? The impact of a ›Cash-for-Care‹ benefit for immigrant and native mothers labor market participation ( Memento of the original of December 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 169 kB). In: Labor Economics . 17, No. 6, 2010, pp. 963-974. doi : 10.1016 / j.labeco.2010.02.008 . @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.zew.de
  26. ↑ Brita Bungum and Elin Kvande: The rise and fall of cash for care in Norway: changes in the use of child-care policies . In: Nordic Journal of Social Research . 4, 2013, pp. 31-54.
  27. ↑ Tuomas Kosonen: To Work or Not to Work? The Effect of Child-Care Subsidies on the Labor Supply of Parents (PDF; 1.3 MB). Government Institute for Economic Research, Working Paper No. 23, 2011.

literature

  • Dominik Bär: The childcare allowance - policy with and for children looks different . In: Our Youth 9/2012, pp. 354–364. doi : 10.2378 / uj2012.art33d .
  • Tilman Mayer and Wiebke Rösler: The “paradigm shift” for the introduction of parental allowance and its faulty constructions . In: Journal of Family Research . 25, No. 2, 2013.

Web links

Wiktionary: Betreuungsgeld  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations