The German Economic Institute (IW) has reported that the country's special fund for infrastructure has largely failed to generate additional investment one year after its approval. The institute claims that 86% of the money used in the past year was diverted from its intended purpose and that another 12 billion euros from the fund was used for core budget spending. The study also revealed that the German government's actual investment spending, including the fund and excluding financial transactions, totalled about 71 billion euros ($81.50 billion) in 2025.