Are the SPD about to take the axe to the welfare state?

Last November, a Social Democrat-led government collapsed after then-Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) repeatedly butted heads with his finance minister, Christian Lindner (FDP), about the need to cut back federal spending.

Scholz refused to countenance welfare cuts at a time when Germany was increasing military spending. Doing so would “give fuel to populists and extremists”, he insisted. And besides, he said, there was another solution. Germany has the lowest debt in the G7 and when Scholz met his colleagues from this elite club, they couldn’t believe that Germany wasn’t borrowing more, he claimed.

Budget crises caused by excessive government debts were lurking on the horizon in two G7 neighbours - France and the UK - but Scholz didn’t (want to) see them coming.

Now in control of the Finance Ministry, it is the SPD who find themselves in the role of Ebenezer Scrooge as they admit that, actually, even after the government decided to take on a trillion euros in new debt, there still isn’t en…