BERLIN, Oct. 19 (Xinhua) -- The number of people receiving needs-based welfare benefits in Germany fell last year, figures published on Friday by the country's Federal Statistical Office show.
According to the Wiesbaden-based government agency, Germans who received diverse forms of social security payments aimed at providing them with a minimum income fell by 3.5 percent to 7.6 million at the end of 2017. As a consequence, the share of the entire population which was reliant on such state aid also declined to 9.2 percent, down by 0.3 and 0.5 percentage points compared with 2016 and 2015 respectively.
The German welfare state gives residents access to a range of financial subsidies which are tailored to their specific personal circumstances. The most well-known and widespread benefit available in the eurozone's largest economy are so-called "Hartz IV" payments which are mainly provided to long-term unemployed individuals. In 2017, 5.9 million inhabitants were enrolled in the "Hartz IV" program, marking a slight annual decrease of 0.7 percent.
Hartz IV is distinct from a regular subsistence allowance which Germans can apply for if their own income is insufficient to make ends meet. Between 2016 and 2017, the number of people who were granted this allowance fell by 4.9 percent to 127,000.
The steepest decline across the categories of welfare benefits was measured among refugees. A total of 486,000 individuals were provided with aid to take care of their basic needs during ongoing asylum application cases in 2017, down by 35.7 percent compared with 2016. The finding further underscored a trend of weakening of financial and logistical pressures from the 2015 "refugee crisis" which has been recorded by German authorities during the past two years.
By contrast to "Hartz IV", subsistence allowance, and refugee-related aid, the number of Germans who required an old-age basic income provision increased last year. The number of elderly people accessed this welfare benefit rose by 3.2 percent to 1.1 million in 2017.
