Hesse parliament approves new pay model for state employees

Hesse’s parliament has approved a new pay model for state civil servants, combining salary increases with a different way of calculating family-related benefits.

The agreement reached for state employees will also apply to civil servants. Their pay will rise by 3%, with a minimum increase of 110 euros per month, retroactive to July 1, 2026. A second increase of 2.8% will follow on Oct. 1, 2027. The governing coalition of the CDU and SPD backed the bill.

The legislation replaces the existing single-earner model with a family-income model. For a family with two children, the system will count a fictional monthly income of almost 1,000 euros for the second adult. The family allowance for each of the first two children will increase by 87 euros, and the starting salary for civil servants will rise slightly.

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Legally questionable

Opposition lawmakers raised constitutional concerns during the debate. Green party member Christoph Sippel called the fictional partner income “legally questionable” and said Hesse was using arbitrary sums instead of clear criteria such as the subsistence minimum used by other states. He also criticized the absence of a hardship rule for single parents, which he said had become standard in almost all other federal states.

FDP lawmaker Moritz Promny said a legal expert had identified a need for improvements to the family-income model. AfD lawmaker Sandra Weegels said the state planned to count income whose existence it could not know. Interior Minister Roman Poseck defended the change, saying almost all federal states had adopted or were planning a similar model.

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While other federal states use clear criteria such as the subsistence minimum, Hesse relies on arbitrary sums.