{"id":320185,"date":"2025-12-02T08:59:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T08:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/320185\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T08:59:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T08:59:07","slug":"cdu-holds-test-vote-on-fraught-pension-reform-dw-12-02-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/320185\/","title":{"rendered":"CDU holds test vote on fraught pension reform \u2013 DW \u2013 12\/02\/2025"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Like many Western European countries, Germany has an aging population that needs to be cared for in retirement, but who also make up a key voting bloc, especially for the two main\u00a0coalition parties\u00a0\u2014 SPD and CDU.<\/p>\n<p>The parties had agreed to a pension reform in their coalition agreement that would lock in pensions at 48% of the average income until 2031.<\/p>\n<p>Another key aspect is the introduction of the &#8220;active pension&#8221; that aims to encourage pensioners to keep working voluntarily.<\/p>\n<p>But it is the cost of the pensions that has\u00a0<a class=\"internal-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dw.com\/en\/could-the-german-government-collapse-over-pensions-dispute\/a-74791858\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">created a fracture within the coalition government<\/a>, with the 18 Young Union members of the Bundestag threatening to vote against the reform. The government only has a 12-seat majority.<\/p>\n<p>The plan to keep pensions in line with incomes is expected to cost the state \u20ac11 billion ($12.77 billion) by 2031 and up to \u20ac15 billion a year after that if the pinned rate increases, which is what the SPD wants.<\/p>\n<p>The coalition has refused to make changes to the reform to appease the rebellious lawmakers, but Merz has offered a discussion on even deeper reforms for the pension system after 2031.<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, the Young Union continued to say it could not vote in favor of the bill, but stopped short of a full rebellion, saying that each member could vote independently.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday, the Union is set to discuss the legislation and hold a test vote to see if they have the numbers ahead of Friday&#8217;s real vote.<\/p>\n<p>SPD&#8217;s co-leader B\u00e4rbel Bas has said that a failed vote then could stall all further legislation and threaten Merz&#8217;s government.<\/p>\n<p>Young Vs Old? How a fight over pensions is shaking the German government <\/p>\n<p class=\"vjs-no-js\">To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that <a href=\"https:\/\/videojs.com\/html5-video-support\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">supports HTML5 video<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Like many Western European countries, Germany has an aging population that needs to be cared for in retirement,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320186,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[45,49,48,133,131,132],"class_list":{"0":"post-320185","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-finance","12":"tag-personal-finance","13":"tag-personalfinance"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}