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Casenote –– The Fundamental Right to the Guarantee of a Subsistence Minimum in the Hartz IV Decision of the German Federal Constitutional Court

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 March 2019

Stefanie Egidy

Extract

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In February 2010, the German Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht) issued a ruling on the so-called “Hartz IV legislation.” The ruling dealt with the law on social benefits according to the Second Book of the German Code of Social Law and was based on the “fundamental right to the guarantee of a subsistence minimum” derived from the declaration of human dignity in Article 1(1) of the German Basic Law in conjunction with Article 20(1), the principle of the social welfare state.

Type
Research Article
Information
German Law Journal , Volume 12 , Issue 11: Special section - The Hartz IV Case and the German Sozialstaat , 01 November 2011 , pp. 1961 - 1982
Copyright
Copyright © 2011 by German Law Journal GbR 

References

1 Bundesverfassungsgericht [BVerfG] [Federal Constitutional Court] 9 Feb. 2010 (Hartz IV), 125 Entscheidungen des Bundesverfassungsgerichts [BVerfGE] 175 (__), 1 BvL 1/09, para. 1–220, 2010 (Ger.), available at http://www.bverfg.de/entscheidungen/ls20100209_1bvl000109.html (last visited 4 Nov. 2011).Google Scholar

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4 Hartz IV, 125 BVerfGE 175 (__),1 BvL 1/09 of 9 Feb. 2010, para. 132.Google Scholar

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19 Hartz IV, 125 BVerfGE 175 (__),1 BvL 1/09 of 9 Feb. 2010, headnote 1 and para. 135.Google Scholar

20 See id. at paras. 136–37.Google Scholar

21 See id. at para. 138.Google Scholar

22 See id. (suggesting that the Constitutional Court, in contrast to the lower courts, only follows the concept of the socio-cultural subsistence minimum without adopting this notion).Google Scholar

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25 Id. at para. 143.Google Scholar

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29 See id. at paras. 159–72.Google Scholar

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36 Id. at para. 191.Google Scholar

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42 Id. Google Scholar

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48 See id. at para. 216.Google Scholar

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69 See Lenze, supra note 53, at 22; see also Zacher, supra note 63, at 370.Google Scholar

70 Compare Bieback, supra note 8, at 142, with Bittner, supra note 2, at 1951 (further interpreting the term “subsistence minimum,” and distinguishing between tax and social benefits law).Google Scholar

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81 See Hartz IV, 125 BVerfGE 175 (__),1 BvL 1/09 of 9 Feb. 2010, para. 138; Soria, supra note 53, at 649.Google Scholar

82 See Soria, supra note 53, at 649; 94 BVerwGE 326 (331–32); Rothkegel, Ralf, Ein Danaergeschenk für den Gesetzgeber, Zum Urteil des Bundesverfassungsgerichts vom 9. Februar 2010 – 1 BvL 1, 3, 4/09 -, 49 Zeitschrift für die Sozialrechtliche Praxis 135, 137 (2010).Google Scholar

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84 See Arnauld, supra note 9, at 287; see also Volker Neumann, Menschenwürde und Existenzminimum, Neue Zeitschrift fur Verwaltungsrecht 426, 432 (1995); Soria, supra note 53, at 651. Regarding the question of the consistency of the respective provisions, see Stephan Rixen, Verfassungsrecht ersetzt Sozialpolitik? “Hartz IV” auf dem Prüfstand des Bundesverfassungsgerichts, 14 Sozialrecht Aktuell 81, 87 (2010).Google Scholar

85 For the argument that the Constitutional Court again creates another fundamental right, see Thorsten Kingreen, Schätzungen “ins Blaue hinein”: Zu den Auswirkungen des Hartz IV-Urteils des Bundesverfassungsgerichts auf das Asylbewerberleistungsgesetz, Neue Zeitschrift fur Verwaltungsrecht 558 (2010). See also Lenze, supra note 53, at 4–5 (although she includes the previous mentions of this right); Bittner, supra note 2, at 1944.Google Scholar

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102 See Huster and Rux, supra note 63, at 203.2.Google Scholar

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127 In substance, the Federal Constitutional Court transferred the procedural criteria for a determination of social aid by the executive, developed by the Federal Administrative Court, to the Hartz IV legislation Rothkegel, supra note 82, at 141. See 366 BVerwGE 102 (368); 108 BVerwGE 221 (227).Google Scholar

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130 See Michael, supra note 120, at 880.Google Scholar

131 See id. at 879.Google Scholar

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133 See id. Google Scholar

134 See Bittner, supra note 2, at 1954.Google Scholar

135 See Rixen, supra note 84, at 85.Google Scholar

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140 See Rothkegel, supra note 82, at 145–46.Google Scholar

141 See Lenze, supra note 53, at 8–9.Google Scholar

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143 See Rixen, supra note 84, at 86; Rothkegel, supra note 82, at 141.Google Scholar

144 See Rothkegel, supra note 82, at 146, using the doctrine of the administrative act as a model.Google Scholar

145 See id. Google Scholar

146 See id. Google Scholar

147 See id. at 142, 146.Google Scholar

148 See Sozialgesetzbuch [SGB II] [Second Book of the German Code of Social Law] 1 Jan. 2011, § 20(2) (showing increase from €359 to €364). For a comparison to the former version, see supra note 15.Google Scholar

149 Id. at § 77(4).Google Scholar

150 Gesetz zur Ermittlung von Regelbedarfen und zur Änderung des Zweiten und Zwölften Buches Sozialgesetzbu [SGB II and XII] [Second and Twelfth Book of the German Code of Social Law] [Act on the determination of standard benefits and modification] 24 Mar. 2011, BGBl. I at 453 (Ger.).Google Scholar

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152 Hartz IV, 125 BVerfGE 175 (__),1 BvL 1/09 of 9 Feb. 2010, para. 217.Google Scholar

153 See id. at para. 219.Google Scholar

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