Overview
- Green co-leader Felix Banaszak said his party will vote against the bill and refused to act as a parliamentary backstop for the coalition.
- Eighteen members of the Union’s Young Group threaten to withhold support, leaving the coalition without a secure Bundestag majority ahead of a December vote.
- Unionsfraktionschef Jens Spahn urged internal discipline to keep the coalition governing, while Chancellor Friedrich Merz floated an accompanying resolution and an accelerated pension commission to calm dissent.
- The Greens published a rival plan that pares back early-retirement pathways including reform of the "Rente mit 63", broadens contributors to include new civil servants, some self‑employed and MPs, leans on capital-market elements, and seeks a simple guarantee against old-age poverty.
- Twenty-one leading economists urged withdrawing the package as fiscally unsustainable, and DIW chief Marcel Fratzscher promoted a flat monthly "Rentenpauschale" as an alternative way to lift payments without loading extra costs onto younger generations.