German fertility policy subsidy

There are many reasons for the increase of female fertility rate in Germany in recent years: first, the number of women of childbearing age has increased, mainly because the children or grandchildren of the postwar baby boomers have reached childbearing age; The second is the result of the increase of young immigrants; Third, the "complementary effect" brought about by women's delayed childbearing because of ideological emancipation. However, it is undeniable that a large number of family policy measures implemented by the German government, especially since 2003, have played an important role in improving the fertility rate of German women, or at least avoiding the continuous decline of the fertility rate of German women.

In 2003, Rehnert Schmidt (Social Democratic Party), then German Minister of Family, clearly put the demographic structure and labor market goals on the agenda of family policy, which also contributed to the reform of German family policy since the beginning of the 2/kloc-0 century. Today, the goals of German family policy include: family's economic stability and social participation, good coordination between family life and professional life, children's happiness and development, and the realization of children's desire. It can be seen that the goal of adjusting the population structure has also been explicitly included. At present, there are more than 50 supporting measures related to marriage and family in Germany. These policies and measures mainly provide or improve basic conditions for women to have children from three dimensions: capital, time and infrastructure. Among these measures, the following measures are particularly worth mentioning:

One is child allowance, child allowance. The choice between the two is decided by the German Finance Bureau according to the principle of "benefiting taxpayers". According to the German Federal Child Allowance Law, the monthly allowance for one child and two children is 2 19 euros, three children are 225 euros, and the fourth child is 250 euros per child. The right to receive child allowance can be up to 18 years old, up to 25 years old for children who have received vocational training and university study, and up to 2 1 year old for children who have no job. In addition to child allowance, low-income families can also apply for child allowance, with a maximum monthly amount of 209 euros per child. Such people can also apply for education and social participation funds (education assistance package) and apply for exemption from childcare fees. Child allowance is the deduction when parents pay income tax. At present, the exemption amount for each child is: the basic exemption amount is 2,730 euros, and the exemption amount for child care, support and training needs is 65,438 euros +0.464 euros. If the estimated tax amount of both parents is the same, the tax exemption amount will be doubled, totaling 8388 euros.

The second is parental allowance. There are three kinds of parental allowance, namely, basic parental allowance, "parental allowance+"and special partner allowance. Parents who take care of and raise their children by themselves after the birth of their children can receive basic parental allowance, provided that they do not work full-time (no more than 30 hours per week). The basic allowance for parents is paid at 65% of the net income from work before childbirth, which actually depends on the income loss before and after childbirth (at least 300 euros per month and at most 1800 euros). In principle, each parent can receive the basic parental allowance for at least two months, the longest is 12 months, but the longest cumulative period is 14 months. Parents' basic allowance can only be received in the first 14 months after the child is born. In order to encourage parents to take part-time jobs after giving birth, parents can receive "parental allowance+"for children born after 15 July. The period of "parental allowance+"is twice as long as the basic parental allowance. If you don't work after giving birth, the amount of "parental allowance+"is only half of the basic parental allowance. However, if you work part-time, it is the same as receiving basic parental allowance and working part-time at the same time. In addition, "Parental Allowance+"also stipulates an option of partner reward: if both parents share the responsibility of taking care of their children and work part-time for at least 25 to 30 hours a week, each of them can get an extra four months of "Parental Allowance+". It is worth mentioning that families with many young children can also get "special allowance for brothers and sisters", the amount of which is 10% of the parents' allowance. For parents' basic allowance, this special allowance is at least 75 euros per month, and for "parental allowance+",it is at least 37.5 euros per month.

The third is parents' holiday. Before the child reaches the age of three, every parent has the right to take up to three years of parental leave in order to take care of and raise the child. Parental leave is a right of employees relative to employers. During the parents' holiday, employees enjoy the protection of termination, and the labor relationship continues, which is only the suspension of the main obligations in the labor relationship. Employees have the right to return to their previous jobs after their parents' holidays. Moreover, during parents' holidays, they can do part-time jobs for less than 30 hours a week; If both parents are on vacation at the same time, they can work part-time within 60 hours a week. According to the transitional part-time work regulations, parents can work part-time within 1 to 5 years, and then they can return to their previous full-time working hours. In addition, parents can postpone the holiday of up to 24 months until the child turns 3 but before he turns 8. In order to increase the flexibility of parents' holidays, each parent can divide their total holidays into three periods.

The fourth is to improve child care conditions. In recent years, Germany has been expanding nursing places, especially for children under 3 years old. From August 20 13 1 day, all children over one year old have the right to receive subsidies from nurseries or children's day care centers. The German government also launched the "Nursery Plus" funding scheme to support nurseries to set more flexible opening hours, so as to support families to better coordinate family life and professional life. In addition, Germany also plans to introduce the right to full-time care for primary school students by 2025. At the same time, German governments at all levels are also increasing the recruitment and training of professionals in kindergartens through various funded projects.

The Evaluation Report on the Influence of German Family Policy Measures on Fertility commissioned by the German Federal Ministry for Family Affairs shows that these measures are effective, but their influence on women's decision to have children is limited and indirect. First of all, the macro-level conclusion of this assessment report is that most of the influencing factors of fertility rate are related to parents' personal life background (such as suitable partner, secure job, family experience, education level, etc.). ), family policy has indirect influence on it at most. Second, family policy measures and social views on the family influence each other. The former can promote the change of society's attitude towards the family to a positive direction, and urge women to decide to have children, while the latter will also affect the introduction and setting of family policies and measures. Third, if family policy measures are to have a positive impact on fertility decision-making, other related policies (including housing, social welfare, labor market, education and health policies, etc.) should also play a positive role. ) Qi Xin must work together. Finally, women's reproductive decisions are also influenced by social norms and political and legal factors, including, for example, the reliability of the framework conditions established by the policy and the possibility of equal participation of men and women in professional life and family life.

From the micro-impact of the above-mentioned family policy measures, the evaluation report believes that family-related support measures in time, money and infrastructure can affect women's reproductive decisions by reducing the direct cost of children and the opportunity cost of women's childbearing. Specific to individual measures, the evaluation report pointed out that in terms of short-term impact, parental allowance and child allowance or child allowance can have a significant impact on women's reproductive decisions, but the short-term impact of most family policy measures is neutral. However, in the long run, subsidized child-rearing plays the most important role in raising the fertility rate, which can improve the coordination between family life and professional life. The increase in family income brought by female employment will stimulate families to have more children. In addition, children's allowance and children's allowance have great positive effects from the perspective of cross-life cycle, even exceeding the effect of parents' allowance. However, from the perspective of the government's cost-bearing, parental allowance is more efficient than child allowance and child allowance, which means that every euro invested has a greater pulling effect on the fertility rate.

In addition, the evaluation report also pointed out that compared with the childcare allowance paid in Germany until 2006, the childcare allowance supports women to return to the workplace more quickly, which will have a positive impact on women's medium and long-term career prospects planning. International comparison shows that longer parental leave will strengthen the traditional division of labor between the sexes and have a negative impact on women's (re-) employment, while women's choice of staying at home for a long time will not increase the fertility rate.

Family-friendly policies and measures covering all fields in Germany

German family policy is an important part of social policy. As mentioned above, family policy measures have also penetrated into other policy areas. Moreover, Germany has implemented family-friendly policies and measures in various policy fields, laying a comprehensive foundation for the improvement of fertility rate in Germany.

For example, in terms of tax law, Germany implements the priority tax payment system for husband and wife, so that both husband and wife can pay taxes together. This measure will bring tax benefits, especially if the income gap between husband and wife is large. Therefore, this system is conducive to one of the spouses (often the wife) not working or just doing odd jobs, so as to better take care of and raise the children. However, this policy is also controversial because it encourages one spouse to have a high income while the other spouse hardly works.

In the field of housing, Germans mainly choose to rent houses instead of owning their own houses. A global consumer survey shows that the rental rate in Germany has reached 64%, which means that the rental rate in Germany has reached nearly two-thirds. Germany's strong tenant protection regulations and relatively stable rent levels are also conducive to reducing the living costs of families with relatively low average income. In addition, due to the low average family income, families with many children are more likely to obtain the "residence qualification certificate" required for renting social security housing. However, in recent years, Germany is also encouraging young families to buy or build their first home. For example, during the period from1October 20 18 1 to March 202 1, Germany introduced the children's housing allowance, according to which each family or individual caregiver can get 10 for each child. Children's housing allowance has been welcomed by middle-income young families, and the increase of new houses has also eased the rental market and curbed the rent increase in big cities. However, there are also criticisms that the subsidies granted by the government are just a drop in the bucket, because the cost of building or buying houses is high and the pulling effect is limited.

In the field of social security, the special burden of families with children is considered. For example, when receiving unemployment insurance benefits, unemployed people with one or more children receive unemployment insurance benefits of 67% of their net salary in the previous year, while unemployed people without children only receive 60%. For another example, the statutory medical insurance implements the family joint insurance system, and family members (spouses or children) who have no income or whose monthly income is less than 470 euros can enjoy family joint insurance without paying insurance premiums. In nursing insurance, the current rate is 3.05% of the total income, and the insured who has no children over the age of 23 has to pay an additional premium of 0.25% for childlessness.

In the field of education, Germany also has preferential policies for many children in some federal States. For example, Germany once levied university tuition fees in some federal States. At that time, in Baden-Wü rttemberg, it was stipulated that if a family had more than one child to go to college, the second child could be exempted from tuition. However, Germany has abolished university tuition fees in all federal States. In the field of transportation, many transportation operators offer preferential fares or "family tickets" to families with children.

Family-friendly policies and measures have been incorporated into various policy fields in Germany, which has improved the fertility culture in Germany, enhanced the family awareness of all walks of life, and undoubtedly provided a good social foundation for the improvement of the fertility rate in Germany.

Enlightenment of Germany's measures to encourage fertility to improve fertility rate in China

In order to improve China's population structure, actively implement the national strategy to deal with the aging population, and maintain China's advantages in human resources endowment, a meeting was held in the Political Bureau of the Central Committee on May 365438, 20021,pointing out that the birth policy should be further optimized, and the policy and supporting measures that a couple can have three children should be implemented. Although the fertility rate in Germany has always been at a low level, compared with France, Britain, Sweden and other countries, in recent years, Germany has introduced a series of family policy measures aimed at improving the fertility rate, and conducted in-depth and systematic follow-up research on the impact of various measures on women's fertility decision-making. Germany has implemented universal family-friendly policy measures in various policy fields. Therefore, the gains and losses of Germany's policy measures in increasing fertility rate can provide us with some useful enlightenment.

Generally speaking, we should have a clear and positive understanding of the conditions and scope of supporting fertility measures. Dr Martin Bouillard, research director of the German Federal Population Institute, summarized the relevant family policy measures. It needs to be reiterated that the family policy measures mentioned here have been extended to other policy areas. In the comprehensive report of German Country Study Report (Micro-study) and Cross-country Comparative Study Report (Macro-study), Dr. Martin Bouillard put forward the arguments about the effects of seven family policy measures, as follows:

First, family policy measures have an impact on whether families have children, but the fertility rate cannot be directly regulated by family policies. Secondly, some basic conditions of family policy, such as the possibility of quality care or high money payment, can help young people make a decision to have children. Third, family policies and measures have different effects on different age, education and income groups, and have different effects on starting a family or having two or three children. Parents are more concerned about the coordination between professional life and family life. For having two or three children, they are more concerned about transfer payments and housing. Fourth, the role of family policy measures varies from country to country. Women's return to the labor market after giving birth can be regulated by improving employment rate and labor market security as in Nordic countries, and can also be regulated by a highly flexible labor market as in the United States. Fifth, family-related measures do not work alone, but are mutually conditional, and need the cooperation of taxation, labor market, education and local policies and measures. For example, comprehensive full-time childcare must be coordinated with full-time childcare in primary and secondary schools. Therefore, all governments need to implement an inter-ministerial overall family policy strategy. Sixth, the role of family policy measures is often obviously lagging behind, which means that family policy strategy must be defined as a long-term strategy, and immediate results cannot be expected. For example, publicity is not enough for the measures to coordinate family life and professional life, and it also needs the adjustment of employers and local infrastructure, as well as the recognition of people around them. Seventh, the formulation of family policy measures should not only focus on the adjustment of population structure, because other goals pursued by family policy measures, such as the happiness of children and families, are often promoted through the adjustment of population structure.

As far as the suggestions of family policy measures in Germany are concerned, we must see that the focus of family policy measures oriented to adjusting population structure should be to provide material security for families, improve the coordination between family life and professional life, and provide the possibility of realizing fertility wishes. These goals need to be achieved through policy measures in terms of time, capital and infrastructure. In particular, the following family policy measures are very important for adjusting the population structure: providing the possibility of part-time jobs, improving school and preschool care, giving children allowances and tax allowances for children, parental allowances and providing special transfer payments to families with many children.

But in any case, the policies and measures in the three dimensions of time, money and infrastructure must complement each other in effect, and no measure can work in a short time. In addition, measures in the field of family policy need to be supplemented by family-friendly policies and measures in other policy areas, such as tax policy, housing policy, social security policy, education policy and transportation policy. Only when multi-field measures work together can the fertility rate be raised for a long time.

Under the background of China's liberalization of "three children", promoting families with many children should be the central goal of supporting measures. Although financial support is important, it is more important to create a family culture with many children and improve the infrastructure accordingly. The experience of Germany shows that it is of great significance to provide young women, especially well-educated women, with opportunities for career participation. We should find ways to combine the time needs of parents with many children and provide the possibility of coordinating professional life and family life accordingly. In addition, the corresponding infrastructure should also be kept up, including the problems of multi-child nursery and school, and providing living space for families with many children, including giving priority to renting affordable housing and housing subsidies. In a word, the optimization of birth policy needs the joint efforts of all relevant departments and all social actors.