The coronavirus pandemic plunged Germany into a massive deficit in 2020, the largest since the country was reunited in 1991, according to overall budget figures released by the statistics office Destatis on Wednesday.
Compared to 2019, spending last year increased by 12.1 per cent to 1.67 trillion euros (1.99 trillion dollars), Destatis said.
Meanwhile, earnings decreased by 3.5 per cent to 1.48 trillion euros.
This results in a public sector deficit of 189.2 billion euros.
“This result clearly shows the consequences of the coronavirus crisis for the public budgets,” Destatis said in a statement.
This is the first deficit Germany has booked in seven years, according to the statement. In 2019, there was a surplus of 45.2 billion euros.
The data is based on preliminary results of the core and extraordinary budgets of the federal government, the 16 states, local authorities, state social security as well as EU investments.
