Overview
- Employees in Saxony pay about 0.5 percentage points more into long‑term care insurance, averaging roughly €207 per worker each year.
- The surcharge stems from the 1994/95 reform that funded care insurance by dropping the holiday nationwide, a step Saxony declined under Kurt Biedenkopf.
- DGB Sachsen, represented by deputy chair Daniela Kolbe, demands the extra cost be abolished while the holiday remains and presses the state government to file the initiative in the Bundesrat.
- The legal status is unchanged this year, with Buß‑ und Bettag a public holiday only in Saxony and a normal workday in other states.
- In Bavaria, students have no classes while most workplaces stay open, teachers attend trainings, and a proposal to swap the day for the Friday after Ascension faces legal and church obstacles.