By IRNA,
Berlin : Almost every sixth German child under the age of 15 is living on social welfare, the Saarbuecken-based daily Saarbuecker Zeitung cited government figures as saying Thursday.
Around 1.74 million or 15.8 percent of Germany’s children depend on the minimum form of state handouts, dubbed ‘Hartz IV’.
The situation is especially dramatic in the German capital where more than every third child (36.2 percent) is living on Hartz IV.
According to the German government, children from single-parent, migrant and large families are especially facing the risk of being poor.
Experts have cited the high unemployment rate in some parts of Germany, deep social welfare cuts and the breakdown of family values as the main reasons for the dramatic surge in the number of needy children.