Germany's 2027 budget: A record €561 billion and a mountain of debt

The 2027 federal budget proposal has finally been hammered out and is set for a vote in parliament. What are the government's policy priorities in defense, infrastructure, the economy and social spending? It was 5:55 a.m. on Friday morning when the Bundestag 's Budget Committee concluded its final session.

Following nearly 16 hours of negotiations, lawmakers from the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Christian Social Union (CSU) parties, along with their coalition partners from the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), voted in favor of the 2027 draft budget. The opposition parties — the environmentalist Greens , the socialist Left Party and the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) — voted against it. With that, the way is now clear for the final vote in the Bundestag on November 27. Reading through the nearly 1,000-page document requires a great deal of number-crunching.

Next year, the federal government plans to spend around €561 billion ($620 billion). But here's the problem: it won't collect nearly enough revenue to cover these expenses.