Germany posted total public sector surplus of 6.4b euros in 2014

[BERLIN] Germany's public sector posted a total budget surplus in 2014 of 6.4 billion euros (S$9.5 billion), helped by strong tax revenues in a recovering economy, compared with a deficit of 7.2 billion the previous year, the Federal Statistics Office said on Tuesday.

The surplus took into account provisional quarterly results at federal, state and municipal level plus the social security system. The federal government received 2.3 billion euros more than it spent and the 16 states were 1.6 billion euros in the black. The social security system posted a surplus of 3 billion euros.

However, local authorities recorded a deficit of 0.7 billion euros.

Berlin, which has preached budget discipline to its eurozone partners, balanced its federal budget for the first time in almost half a century last year.

This has put Europe's biggest economy under international pressure to spend more to help revive a moribund global economy, and last month the cabinet approved plans to boost spending by 15 billion euros over the coming four years.

REUTERS