The social budget for the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg is facing significant upward pressure, with total spending rising from €2.62 billion euros in 2020 to €3.62 billion in 2024, totaling 38 percent over four years .
The information comes in Senate response to a parliamentary inquiry from the AfD. Preliminary data for 2025 indicates that expenditures through November have already reached roughly €3.4 billion.
In addressing the surge, the Senate pointed toward “significantly rising housing and energy costs” as the primary drivers of the increase. The Alternative for Germany (AfD), which requested the data, instead lays the blame at the feet of mass immigration.
Thomas Reich, the social policy spokesman for the AfD parliamentary group, challenged the Senate’s explanation for the budget expansion. In a press release, Reich stated: “Hamburg is increasingly suffocating from excessively rising social spending. The Senate’s justification that higher housing and energy costs alone are responsible is fundamentally wrong.“
Reich argues that the primary catalysts for the “cost explosion” are “an uncontrolled migration policy and the consequences of a left-green energy policy, which increases both the number of benefit recipients and the cost of living.”
When the 2024 total of €3.62 billion is broken down, it consists of €2.22 billion funded by Hamburg and €1.17 billion provided by federal funds. The city’s independent contribution of €2.22 billion now represents about ten percent of its total budget.
Data from August 2025 highlights a sharp rise in costs for benefits provided to foreign nationals, with over €1.2 billion euros paid to non-German recipients in 2024. These payments are distributed across three primary systems, including the citizen’s allowance, basic security, and the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act.
The figures further reveal that the number of German and foreign nationals receiving a citizen’s allowance in Hamburg is basically equal, despite foreigners representing only between 15 and 21 percent of the population.
In 2024, approximately 92,700 Germans were recipients, compared to roughly 93,800 foreigners, which shows that even more foreigners than Germans receive such benefits.
Additionally, there were over 20,500 foreign recipients of asylum seeker benefits.
However, the overall population of Hamburg features 40 percent with a foreign background, meaning that many German citizens have foreign origins.
The inquiry also shed light on substantial monthly payouts for large “need communities.” In 2024, 86 households with six or more children received citizen’s allowance payments exceeding €8,000 per month. Similar high-value payouts were noted within the asylum-seeker benefit system, particularly for families with many children.
This hardly accounts for the overall financial burden of immigration. Hamburg schools are in chaos due to multiculturalism, with record levels of violence. The schools now feature a majority of children with a migration background. In addition, healthcare costs are exploding as well, totaling hundreds of millions spent on foreigners.
Overall, in Germany, 63 percent of all welfare recipients have a migration background.
