The CEO of a German statutory health insurance company has warned that the CDU / CSU-SPD’s recent coalition agreement will soon bring significant additional contribution price hikes for residents.
Andreas Storm, CEO of the German statutory health insurer DAK-Gesundheit, has warned that insured people could soon be paying significantly more in additional statutory health insurance contributions (Zusatzbeiträge).
Not all statutory health insurance providers in Germany charge a Zusatzbeitrag, but if your chosen provider does, you’re obliged to pay it. The additional contribution entitles patients to further treatments, such as cancer screenings under 30, contraception, or teeth cleaning, without them having to pay more upfront.
Each year, the German federal government adjusts the recommended limits for the average additional contribution rates. This was last adjusted in January 2025, from 1,7 percent to 2,5 percent of an insured person’s income before tax.
According to Storm’s assessment, this recommended limit will increase by another 0,5 percentage point at the end of 2025. This means people working in Germany would pay another 0,25 percent (25 euros for every 1.000 euros earned per month) towards additional statutory health insurance contributions by 2026.
"If further action is not taken, a contribution tsunami is inevitable with this coalition agreement," Storm told the Augsburger Allgemeine newspaper. "In conjunction with rising long-term care insurance contributions (Pflegeversicherung), we are then moving towards total social security contributions of 43 percent.”
After over a month of negotiations, the incoming CDU / CSU-SPD government announced their coalition agreement in early April.
According to Storm, financing plans laid out in initial drafts of the agreement had earmarked 20 billion euros to cover “non-insurance costs” of statutory health insurance, in 2025 and 2026.
“Non-insurance costs” fund services which health insurance companies must provide even though they are not included in their mandate, such as delivering babies. Initial drafts had also earmarked over nine billion for Pflegeversicherung.
"All concrete measures mentioned in the drafts that could have ensured the goal of stable social security contributions in the short term were deleted from the final coalition agreement," Storm claimed.
Storm warned that not sufficiently funding Germany’s already financially stretched insurance system would be “poison for the economy”.
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