Church tax

According to Article 140 of the Basic Law in conjunction with Article 137 of the Weimar Constitution, which is still valid for this area, "Religious communities which are corporations under public law are entitled to levy taxes on the basis of the civil tax lists in accordance with the provisions of state law. The more detailed provision under state law in Bremen is the Church Tax Act of the State of Bremen. According to this law, churches in the State of Bremen are entitled to levy church taxes from their church members on the basis of their own church tax regulations. Only the Jewish Community in the State of Bremen and the Protestant and Catholic Churches represented in the State of Bremen currently make use of this right. While the Jewish community collects the church tax from its parishioners in its own jurisdiction, both the Protestant and the Catholic Church have delegated the collection of their church tax to the tax authorities of the State of Bremen. For the church tax, income tax and wage tax are the basis of calculation. It currently amounts to 9% of this basis of calculation.