One of the central points in the relief package presented on Sunday is the electricity price brake.

A price cap is planned for a certain amount of electricity, the so-called basic consumption.

But apparently it is still unclear whether all households should actually benefit from this or only those up to a certain income limit.

A spokeswoman for Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck (Greens) commented evasively on this question on Monday: "I can't answer that conclusively either, that's also being discussed and then poured into a concrete proposal."

Julia Loehr

Business correspondent in Berlin.

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This is remarkable because the coalition committee's decision does not contain any indication that this relief measure could be differentiated according to income group.

Specifically, the paper on the electricity price brake says: “Private households can be credited with a certain amount of electricity at a reduced price (basic consumption).

Households are noticeably relieved financially and at the same time there is an incentive to save energy.

For small and medium-sized companies with a utility tariff, the same processing applies as for households.”

The electricity price brake is, at least according to the wording of the paper, one of the points in the relief package, from which not only the recipients of transfer payments but also the working middle class and medium-sized entrepreneurs should benefit.

The only other significant relief for them is the adjustment of the tax rate to inflation (reduction of the cold progression), the increase in child benefit and the full deductibility of the pension insurance contributions – which was a matter of course in previous years.

Low-income households should benefit

Before Habeck's spokeswoman commented on the electricity price brake, Green Party leader Omid Nouripour had already made it clear that the electricity price brake should primarily benefit people with little money.

It will be about a small amount of electricity that you need to make ends meet, he said on "Deutschlandfunk": "We are talking about a family in 48 square meters and not about a villa." Such households should cover 100 percent of their consumption in the Price capped, others only a fraction.

Many details are still open as to how the 19 relief measures, some of which have several sub-items, are to be financed.

Even on Monday, the federal government could not explain how the figure of 65 billion euros in relief is actually composed.

Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) only said on Sunday that 32 billion euros should be financed from the existing budget plans for this year and next.

Part of the promised relief is to come from the companies, such as the electricity producers, whose "chance profits" are now to be redistributed.

Other measures such as the 49 or 69 euro ticket are to be co-financed by the federal states, although their willingness to do so has so far varied.