Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Thursday Germany is collecting enough taxes to afford its growing costs in the European migration crisis, despite a small dip in revenues in 2016.
He said Germany was likely, based on current information, to get by without any net increase in public debt next year.
The minister made the comments during a press conference in Berlin on on Germany's projected tax income.
Unveiling a forecast of revenues available to the federal, state and local governments, he said there was no debt danger and the data showed their budgeted expenditures were "solidly financed."
"That is especially significant, given the huge challenges, especially from large-scale immigration and its associated challenges," he said. "You can see, it's not a bad idea to have financed safely in times when it was not so challenging."
The data shows this year's revenue in the three tiers of government will pan out 5.2 billion euros higher than estimated in May, then, in 2016, fall short by 5.2 billion euros compared to past forecasts.
The shortfall reflects changes in tax law. A mark-up totaling 4.8 billion euros in the three years 2017 to 2019 was attributed in the new revenue forecast to the robust German economy where both wages and pensions are set to rise.
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