Overview

• Marie-Christine Ostermann, who leads the Verband der Familienunternehmer, proposes scrapping the levy for firms in the eastern federal states.
• She argues East German companies were disadvantaged in building equity until 1989 and says abolition would strengthen capital for family businesses and craft firms.
• Ostermann is skeptical of Markus Söder’s plan to let each state set its own inheritance tax rates, warning of a 16-rule patchwork.
• She says regionalization would drive up bureaucracy for businesses operating across multiple states.
• Chancellor Friedrich Merz has rejected regionalization, citing a lack of consensus among the Länder, and she points to Austria’s zero inheritance tax as a competitive challenge for German border regions.