Burden Equalization Act

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Basic data
Title: Law on equalization of burdens
Short title: Burden Equalization Act
Abbreviation: LAG
Type: Federal law
Scope: Federal Republic of Germany   
Legal matter: Administrative law , social law
References : 621-1
Original version from: August 14, 1952
( BGBl. I p. 446 )
Entry into force on: September 1, 1952
New announcement from: June 2, 1993
( BGBl. I p. 845 ,
ber. 1995 I p. 248 )
Last change by: Art. 211 Regulation of June 19, 2020
( Federal Law Gazette I p. 1328, 1352 )
Effective date of the
last change: 		June 27, 2020
(Art. 361 of June 19, 2020)
Please note the note on the applicable legal version.
Bureau equalization committee in the Federal Palace in 1961

The Law on the Load Balancing ( Load Balancing Act , LAG ) from August 14, 1952, had the goal of German , as a result of the Second World War had suffered and its after-effects of financial losses or special other drawbacks, a financial compensation to grant. Load balancing can be demanding

  • Damaged by direct effects of war (destruction e.g. by bombs or other weapons)
  • Late comers
  • who had suffered losses

So it says in the preamble:

"In recognition of the claim of the sections of the population particularly affected by the war and its consequences to a compensation of burdens taking into account the principles of social justice and economic possibilities and to the help necessary for the integration of the injured, and with the express reservation that the granting and acceptance of services does not mean a waiver of the assertion of claims for the return of the property left behind by the displaced person, and with the further express reservation that the granting and acceptance of services for damage within the meaning of the Evidence Preservation and Establishment Act neither affect the property rights of the injured party The Bundestag, with the consent of the Bundesrat, has passed the following law. "

The model for the law was the legislation on equalization of burdens in Finland after the expulsion of the Finns from Karelia .

During the Second World War, property damage to movable and immovable property as a result of an attack on the Reich territory was compensated for in accordance with the War Damage Ordinance , repealed by §§ 373 No. 3, 375 LAG.

Levies for burden sharing

This redistribution was done by paying a burden equalization charge to those who had substantial assets left (in particular real estate ). The amount of this tax was calculated according to the amount of the property as of June 21, 1948, the day after the introduction of the D-Mark in the 3 western occupation zones. The levy amounted to 50% of the calculated asset and could be paid into the compensation fund in up to 120 quarterly installments, spread over 30 years. For this purpose, a property levy , a mortgage profit levy and a credit profit levy were introduced, which were payable to the tax authorities . By spreading it over many years, the burden was only 1.67% per year, so that it could be paid from the earnings value of the property concerned without having to attack the substance of the property. This was also gradually easier for those affected as a result of the constant inflation since 1952. From the 1980s on, general tax revenues also increasingly flowed into the fund.

Load balancing services

The burden equalization payments totaled around DM 115 billion by the end of 1982 , but that did not stop there. The following types of services are specified in Section 4 LAG:

  • Main
    compensation : Compensation in money in relation to the financial loss suffered for land, real estate, companies, factories. The decision and payment for this often took many years.
  • Integration
    loan : low-interest; to build a new existence (was decided relatively quickly)
  • War damage pension:
    z. B. for victims who lived on rental income from a destroyed house
  • Household contents allowance:
    for a first simple furnishing with furniture, kitchen, laundry, dishes (was decided relatively quickly)
  • Housing assistance:
    preferential treatment for the allocation of rental apartments (the municipalities managed the entire housing space for many years after the war and determined who was allowed to move where)
  • Loans to build a house or purchase an apartment:
    DM 6200; Low- interest rates and secured as an equity substitute
  • Other hardship benefits and benefits based on other support measures:
    for special circumstances of damage - not everything could be explicitly regulated in the law
  • Compensation according to the old savers law :
    for larger financial assets and life insurance
  • Compensation in currency equalization for savings accounts for displaced persons:
    as above, but in foreign currency
  • Loans granted on the basis of the Federal Expellees Act from 1953 to 1957.

Displaced persons

The displaced formed the largest group of those injured by the war and those with the greatest material losses (house, farm, cattle, household effects, livelihood). Helping you quickly and efficiently was what sparked the load balancing idea. That is why the Burden Equalization Act deals in detail with the displaced persons and defines them in § 11. A displaced person is therefore who “as a German citizen or ethnic German resident in the eastern German areas currently under foreign administration or in the areas outside the borders of the German Reich had the territorial status of December 31, 1937 and lost it in connection with the events of World War II as a result of displacement, in particular through expulsion or flight ”.

The term is further extended to those who are "as a German citizen or a German national"

  • "1. left the areas mentioned in paragraph 1 after January 30, 1933 and took up residence outside the German Reich because Nazi acts of violence were perpetrated against him for reasons of political opposition to National Socialism or for reasons of race , belief or belief or threatened him "
  • "2. was resettled from areas outside of Germany on the basis of the intergovernmental agreements concluded during the Second World War or during the same period on the basis of measures taken by German agencies from areas occupied by the German Wehrmacht ( resettlers ), "
  • "3. after the completion of the general expulsion measures before July 1, 1990 or afterwards by way of admission in accordance with the provisions of the first title of the third section of the Federal Expellees Act, the eastern German territories currently under foreign administration, Gdansk , Estonia , Latvia , Lithuania , the Soviet Union , Poland , the Czechoslovakia , Hungary , Romania , Bulgaria , Yugoslavia , Albania and China has left or leaves, except that he, without being driven out of these areas and up to 31 March 1952 returned there after May 8, 1945 a Has established residence in these areas ( Aussiedler ), "
  • "4. without having had a place of residence, constantly exercising his trade or profession in the areas mentioned in paragraph 1 and having to give up this activity as a result of displacement, "
  • "5. lost his place of residence in the areas mentioned in paragraph 1 according to § 10 of the Civil Code through marriage, but had maintained his permanent residence there and had to give it up as a result of displacement, "
  • "6. in the areas mentioned in paragraph 1 as the child of a wife falling under number 5 according to § 11 of the Civil Code, but had a permanent residence and had to give up this due to displacement. "

And finally, the expellee is the one who, “without being a German citizen or a German national, has his place of residence as the spouse of a displaced person or, in cases (...) [of] No. 5, the permanent residence of a German national or German national has lost the areas referred to in paragraph 1. "

State equalization offices and federal equalization office

State equalization offices have been set up in the federal states and the federal equalization office at the federal level for the administrative and organizational processing . The Federal Compensation Office is a higher federal authority. Supervision is carried out by the Federal Ministry of the Interior in agreement with the Federal Ministry of Finance . The Federal Compensation Office is based in Bad Homburg vor der Höhe .

reunion

After the reunification of Germany , the law was changed so that such benefits could also be made available to residents of the acceding area . These equalization payments are budgeted by the federal and state governments in the form of an equalization fund; the federal government is responsible for servicing the interest and repaying the loans taken out for the equalization fund. The federal states (excluding Brandenburg , Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania , Saxony , Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia ) pay up to a maximum of 30 million euros for the fund in the amount of their tax revenue , the rest is borne by the federal government. The rights and obligations of the fund were transferred to the federal government.

On the other hand, those who recovered assets after reunification for the loss of which they had previously received burden equalization payments had to repay the latter. This applies in particular to legal claims from the law regulating unresolved property issues and about state compensation payments for expropriations based on occupation law or occupation sovereignty (Compensation and Compensation Act - EALG).

House interest tax

During the Weimar Republic, the building discharge tax , which was intended to compensate for inflationary gains, had similar goals to those of the Burden Equalization Act .

Legal process

The legal process to the administrative courts is open.

literature

  • Michael L. Hughes: Shouldering the Burdens of Defeat: West Germany and the Reconstruction of Social Justice . University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill 1999, ISBN 0-8078-2494-1 .
  • Manfred Kittel: stepchildren of the economic miracle? The German Expellees from East Germany and the Policy of Equalizing Burdens (1952 to 1975).   Droste, Düsseldorf 2020, ISBN 978-3-770053490 .
  • Lutz Wiegand: The equalization of burdens in the Federal Republic of Germany 1949 to 1985 . Lang, Frankfurt am Main 1992, ISBN 3-631-44497-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Immo Eberl , Konrad G. Gündisch, Ute Richter, Annemarie Röder, Harald Zimmermann : Die Donauschwaben. German settlement in Southeast Europe , exhibition catalog (edited by the Ministry of the Interior of Baden-Württemberg), Wiss. Management d. Exhibition Harald Zimmermann, Immo Eberl, employee. Paul Ginder, Sigmaringen 1987, ISBN 3-7995-4104-7 , p. 271.
  2. ^ Text of the law regulating open property issues
  3. ↑ Law on Compensation in accordance with the Law on the Regulation of Unresolved Property Issues and on State Compensation Payments for Expropriations based on Occupation Law or Occupation Authority (Compensation and Compensation Act - EALG)