Talk:Taxation in Germany

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Contents 1 Sixty-five percent of world tax literature?! 2 Wrong statement about private health insurance 3 POV 4 Indvidual Taxation Example 5 Federal vs. State Taxation: 6 German taxes 7 fiscal year

[edit] Sixty-five percent of world tax literature?!

Please have the information thoroughly checked that sixty-five percent of world tax literature was in German, since this appears to be a mere urban legend. I have seen almost every figure between 50 and 90 for that percentage, I also heard that this percentage referred to literature in German language (thus including Austria and Switzerland) etc. Therefore, please have this statement at least leveled off. 84.176.172.200 18:07, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually it is a urban legend. According to tax expert and former Professor Albert Rädler, there is only ten percent - quite a lot and also most of the worlds tax literature, but far away from extreme 60 percent.[1] Besides: The United States, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands follow with scarce distance. --Fürst Gorg 13:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wrong statement about private health insurance

"while private health insurance policies cover individual risks only" Not true! Private insurance covers children, until they work themselves (and therefore fall into the mandatory public insurance) FreddyE 21:39, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] POV

"The complexity of the German tax system is a result of constant modifications prompted by political and corporate pressure groups, as well as a very German tendency that wishes to regulate everything en detail instead of via broad general rules."

What the heck? From the intro paragraph no less. I am going to remove the last half of that sentence for obvious reasons. - Lucky13pjn 00:24, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Indvidual Taxation Example

The worked example doesn't seem to add up. My calculations are as follows:

€32000, being in the second part of the linear progressive zone, from the description ealier should have tax as follows:

    €0 -  €7664:                =    €0
 €7665 - €12739:  €5076 @ 24%   = €1218
€12740 - €32000: €19260 @ 32.8% = €6317
                      total tax = €7535
- where the 32.8% is calculated as follows:
€32000 - €12740 = €19260
€52152 - €12740 = €39412
€19260/€39412 = 0.4887
 ie: €32000 is 48.87% of the way through the (42%-24%=)18% spread of the second linear progressive zone, and so the rate is:
18% * .4887 =  8.7963%
      + 24% = 32.7963%
(rounded to 32.8%)

This is about €900 more than the worked example - where am I going wrong?

Lwowska 14:46, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry Lwowska.. I wrote the example, but it's been a long time since I've tried to understand it.. I'm going to add a tag saying it needs checking by an expert (as soon as I find out how)..

[edit] Federal vs. State Taxation:

As a foreigner, I wonder how the taxation issues (and income) are divided between the Federal Republic and the states. Does the collected income tax contain a specific percentage of state tax, which is separated before the rest of the money goes for federal budget, or does the federal budget contain also the money that is allocated for the states for their expenses?

Information has been added.Karsten11 (talk) 14:34, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] German taxes

According to a chart from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) of “Comparison of Taxes paid by a household earning the country's average wage” in the tax article, in the United States, a single person with no kids pays 29.1% of his/her income in taxes and a married couple with two kids pays 11.9%; compare to Germans in the same conditions paying 51.8% and 35.7% respectively. 1.78 times and 3 times as much, IOW. This seems incredibly high, even granting that taxes in the US are lower than most places. No mention of this in this article? I can't imagine there's another article more appropriate for discussing it... RobertM525 10:15, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] fiscal year

Is the fiscal year in Germany congruent with the calender year? Tomeasy_talk 18:54, 1 June 2008 (UTC)