Statistic: Record dog tax revenue during the pandemic

Dog tax revenue has climbed to a record high in the second year of the pandemic.

Statistic: Record dog tax revenue during the pandemic

Dog tax revenue has climbed to a record high in the second year of the pandemic. In 2021, around 401 million euros flowed from the dog tax into the public coffers - more than ever before, as the Federal Statistical Office announced on Tuesday. For the cities and municipalities, this meant an increase of 5.4 percent compared to the previous year.

In the first Corona year 2020, the income from the dog tax amounted to 380 million euros. Working from home and limited leisure opportunities may have contributed to this.

The income from the dog tax also increased continuously in the years before Corona, as the Wiesbaden statisticians reported - in a ten-year comparison even by 46 percent: in 2011 the dog tax brought the cities and municipalities only 275 million euros.

Many puppies are given up to animal shelters

The dog tax is a municipal tax. The respective municipality determines the level and structure of the tax statute. In many places, the amount that dog owners have to pay also depends on the number of dogs in the household or the dog breed. In this respect, higher tax revenues do not necessarily mean that the number of these four-legged pets has also increased.

Other sources also document the trend towards pets during the pandemic: the industry association for pet supplies and the central association of zoological specialist companies reported an increase in sales in April: Total sales in the German pet industry rose by almost ten percent in 2021 to a good six billion euros.

According to the German Animal Welfare Association, many animal shelters were overloaded this summer. According to several homes, it was striking that a particularly large number of young dogs were given up. The Association for German Dogs (VDH) explained this, among other things, by the fact that the owners had to go back to work after months in the home office and had no other possibility of care.

NEXT NEWS