Lastenausgleich

Lastenausgleich ("Burden Equalization") was the post World War II program and laws to recompense Germans and ethnic Germans who fled their homelands for their lost properties. This was a very complicated law that transferred enormous wealth to the immigrants over a period of decades. It may well have provided a strong basis for the Wirtschaftswunder or German "economic miracle" in the post-war era. Economic analysis of this activity could influence modern tax laws for understanding how transfer of wealth through higher minimum wage laws and direct transfers can influence a modern economy.

The value of "lost" property during the war was paid at a rate of 50% of its value quarterly over as much as 30 years. By 1982 over 115 billion DM (about $70 billion US dollars as of 1999, when Germany adopted Euros as its currency) has been spent. This outweighs hugely the value of something more than $1 billion Germany received through the Marshall Plan.