In the private sector, high executive salaries are part of the business. However, managers of state-owned companies can also be handsomely rewarded. Bahn boss Lutz, for example, earns almost three times as much as the chancellor. "Scholz, on the other hand, is almost on a voluntary basis," complains the left-wing politician Korte.
The chancellor's job may be strenuous, but it's not one of the best-paid in the public sector. This emerges from a list from the Federal Ministry of Finance, from which the editorial network Germany (RND) quotes. Accordingly, not only do some directors of public broadcasting earn more than Olaf Scholz, but also many heads of state-owned companies and institutions. According to the ministry list, in response to a request from the left-wing faction, at least 21 members of the board of directors or executives of federal companies or institutions receive a higher annual salary than the federal chancellor.
According to RND, the top earners among federally-owned companies are the CEO of Deutsche Bahn, Richard Lutz, with an annual salary of 900,000 euros, as well as the managing director of Bundesdruckerei with 863,000 euros and several board members of the state-owned KfW Bank, who earn between 555,400 euros and 687,600 euros received in the year.
As can also be seen from the list of the Federal Ministry of Finance, other members of the Deutsche Bahn Board of Directors and the management of the Federal Printing Office and the IT service provider of the Federal Government, BWI, as well as the head of the high-tech start-up fund set up by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, are in the area above 500,000 euros an annual salary . The bosses of the toll collector Toll Collect and other top executives at BWI GmbH receive less than half a million euros in annual wages, but they are also higher than Scholz's salary. This consists of the chancellor's salary and half of his MPs' allowance: according to the Bundestag, a total of 360,000 euros a year.
Just behind Scholz there are several other heads of federal companies and institutions on the ministry's list, the report said. The Federal Ministry of Finance kept secret the salaries of the president of the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) and two board members of FMS Wertmanagement, a "bad bank" for the liquidation of the nationalized Hypo Real Estate, in order not to violate personal and informational self-determination rights.
The parliamentary director of the left-wing faction, Jan Korte, spoke of "absurd conditions": "Compared to the board of directors of Deutsche Bahn AG, Chancellor Scholz is almost on a voluntary basis. And he can't do a worse job than Pofalla and Co.," said Korte the RND. "As head of Bundesdruckerei he would probably have less stress, but twice as much salary." Korte sees the spin-off and privatization of state infrastructure and institutions as the cause: "This crazy policy has to stop," he told RND.
