Even if this only works to a limited extent in practice: Anyone who is unemployed and would like to receive citizen’s benefit must sign a cooperation agreement (formerly known as an integration agreement) with the employment office. In it, you undertake to help get back to work as quickly as possible. This not only includes complying with reporting obligations and making it compulsory to attend regular meetings and consultation appointments. You also have to prove that you are writing applications or attending job interviews. Above all, the job centers can oblige recipients of citizens’ benefit to take part in a qualification measure and also to accept reasonable work.
Also read: Dispute over citizens’ money: How big is the problem of total objectors really?
However, with the introduction of citizens’ money, the traffic light coalition took a slightly different course than its predecessor governments. The usual principle of supporting and demanding still applies. However, the current government has to date pursued a philosophy based on motivation, training and personal responsibility rather than on duty and sanctions. For this reason, too, the sanctions from the beginning of 2023 were milder than before. This was not only due to the party political positions of the governing parties, but also to the fact that the Federal Constitutional Court, with a view to the Hartz IV regulations that still existed at the time, had already determined at the end of 2019 that cuts of more than 30 percent in the payment of the transfer benefit „incompatible with the Basic Law” are. (BVerfG judgment of November 5, 2019 – 1 BvL 7/16)