The History of Social Courts and 20 Years of Pension Insurance in the New Laender

Author: Dr. Josef Berchtold/Location: Kassel

...Written version of the speech held by the author at the celebration of “20 Years of Pension Insurance in the New Laender” in Frankfurt/Oder on June 24, 2011

The pension law applicable in the New Laender is, in substance, equivalent to the pension law appliclable in the Old Laender. The German Social Court Law (“Sozial-gerichtsgesetz – SGG”) is also subject to the same regulations across Germany. Thus, the target of insuring legal unity is fairly reached. Nonetheless, the genetic predisposition of this status quo must be taken into account. Particularly, the nation-wide pension law has to consider that a group of insured passed (at least a part of) their employment biographies in the German Democratic Republic (“Deutsche De-mokratische Republik – DDR”) and, thereby, not under the law that is now applica-ble for them. This group requires a considerable amount of special regulations in the substantive German pension law, which leads to a number of legal disputes with a particular kinds of problematics.

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