War in Ukraine is costing Germany dearly
2023.01.12 13:36
War in Ukraine is costing Germany dearly
By Tiffany Smith
Budrigannews.com – The COVID-19 pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine caused the German government’s net borrowing to rise to 124.5 billion euros in 2022, but it was lower than anticipated, according to the country’s finance ministry on Thursday.
According to the finance ministry, government borrowing reached its third-highest level in Germany’s history last year, following records of 215.4 billion euros in 2021 and 130.5 billion euros in 2020.
In 2022, the net borrowing that the German government had anticipated was 138.9 billion euros. The finance ministry claimed that actual borrowing was lower than that estimate due to the fact that all of the spending intended for the pandemic and the negative effects of the war in Ukraine had been unnecessary.
Finance Minister Christian Lindner stated, “We are not exhausting all borrowing possibilities by hook or by crook, but only as far as necessary.”
The finance ministry says that Germany spent 481.3 billion euros last year, which was 14.5 billion euros less than what was planned. This is in contrast to a 2021 expenditure of 557.1 billion euros.
Between 2020 and 2022, in order to make room for additional spending in response to the pandemic and the effects of the war in Ukraine, the German parliament lifted the debt brake that was spelled out in the constitution. This year, the government hopes to adhere once more to the debt brake, which restricts the budget deficit to 0.35 percent of GDP.
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