According to provisional calculations, general government debt in Germany as defined in the Maastricht Treaty amounted to approximately €2.168 trillion at the end of 2014. The debt level thus increased by €2 billion on the year. Owing to nominal GDP growth, the debt ratio, ie the level of debt in relation to gross domestic product (GDP), decreased by 2.4 percentage points to 74.7%. 

After reaching record highs during the financial crisis, Germany's government debt has declined significantly over the past few years. The Bundesbank is expecting Germany to return to compliance with the debt limit of 60% of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2019 at the latest. To better meet the increased statistical requirements in Europe, the Bundesbank makes the case for a more harmonised and integrated accounting system for general government in the current issue of its Monthly Report.

The Bundesbank regards the current design and implementation of the European fiscal rules as problematic. The rules and their implementation are now almost impossible to follow and their binding force is being eroded, it says in the current Monthly Report. The Bundesbank recommends making the rules simpler again and that the exceptions and discretionary leeway be reduced.

Rede von Carl-Ludwig Thiele, Mitglied des Vorstands der Deutschen Bundesbank