The German Constitutional Court has ruled that discriminatory inheritance tax rates for same-sex couples are unconstitutional.
The ruling by Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) means equal inheritance tax rates for gay and married partnerships.
Civil partnerships were introduced in 2001 but failed to support gay couples with the full rights awarded to married spouses, saddling them with a lower tax exemption threshold and a significantly higher inheritance tax rate.
New legislation implemented in December 2008 removed the differentiation. But between 2001 and 2008 registered partners were paying between 17% and 50% inheritance tax, compared with the 7-30% rate faced by hetersexual widows and widowers.
The FCC has set a deadline of December 31 for parliament to rectify the disadvantageous tax policies faced by legally recognized same-sex couples. The ruling was based on tax appeals by civil beneficiaries whose partners had died in 2001 and 2002.
.Tags: tax | individuals | legislation | court | tax rates | inheritance tax | Germany | Germany
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