Constitutional guarantee of a subsistence minimum

From a legal point of view, there are three problem areas of activation policy. The first one involves the constitutional guarantee of a subsistence minimum The second problem concerns the constitutional guarantee of property concerning insurance benefit claims and the third one workfare (public work) as a possible infringement of the constitutional guarantee of occupational freedom.  

The constitutional guarantee of a subsistence minimum seems to be the lynchpin for the admissibility of employment promotion benefits and for the provision of basic security to jobseekers or, alternatively, for the possibility of reducing these benefits as a sanction. 

To date, the Federal Constitutional Court as the highest court in constitutional matters has delivered no decision on the interpretation of the Basic Law in this question. Yet a number of its decisions seem to imply that the right to human dignity in conjunction with the social state principle establishes a positive duty of the state to secure minimum conditions for a life worthy of human beings, thus correlating with a negative duty to prevent state intervention in the subsistence minimum. 

neither the state guarantees regarding human dignity nor the social state principle provide the basis for a definition of the level of basic income support as a minimum level of resources (soziokulturelles Existenzminimum) needed in order to safeguard existence and participation in society. It is the responsibility of parliament to define this standard in accordance with constitutional principles. This refers to the principle of demanding (Fordern) stipulated in 2 SGB II. Need for help is defined in 9 SGB II and is only given if life cannot be sustained by individual effort and resources, in particular if there is not sufficient income from suitable jobs. 

As the social state principle also implies the concept of the social state founded on the basic rights of freedom (freiheitlicher Sozialstaat), the state holds no monopoly on social affairs. Hence, the social state principle epitomises the basic formula of self-responsibility, which also underlies all activating measures of employment promotion. 

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