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[German Version] A credit establishes an in personam relationship between a credit-giver (creditor) and a credit-receiver (debtor). The creditor lends the debtor an amount of money fixed by contract. In return, the debtor takes on the obligation to repay the entire amount to the creditor at the end of the term of the credit. As a fee for the credit, a specified interest rate (Interest) is agreed upon which the debtor must pay the creditor within a defined period for t…

[German Version] By social reform, we mean the reform of the existing social security system in general. The need for such a reform in the Federal Republic of Germany is clear for several reasons. Expenditures related to social policy, more than half of all government spending, consumes the lion’s share of all public spending. In the year 2000, the statutory social security system alone cost 416 billion euros. At present the total “social budget,” which includes government spending ¶ occasioned by distributional policy (such as social welfare and unemployment assistance), …

[German Version] is determined in business economics by the excess of returns over a period of time, after deduction of costs incurred during the same period by the business in pursuit of profit (Corporation, Economy). Profit is the driving force of business commitment; it raises the income of the entrepreneur above the secure level of income achievable in the market. The prerequisite for profit is that the business idea succeeds in the market. In terms of national economy, profit can be defined a…

[German Version] are autonomous decision-making and trading entities in the economy that bring together several legally independent and dependent corporations and businesses at home and abroad. Such concerns are founded, for example, on the basis of a large share of capital, on voting rights, on personal union in the administration or the board of directors. In a merger, by contrast, the uniting corporations and businesses lose their economic independence. The following reasons for the creation of multinational corporations may be listed: economic (such as benefi…

[English Version] I. Zum BegriffDer Begriff Z. geht zurück auf census (lat. Steuerkataster). Konzeptuell dem heutigen Z. vergleichbar sind jedoch erst die ma. censuales oder censuarii, (anfangs noch abhängige) »Zinsleute«, die dem Herrn für die Nutzung von Land periodisch Abgaben entrichteten. Der Z. mochte hier noch immer eine (hoheitliche) Abgabe sein, entscheidend war jetzt jedoch erstmals und blieb seitdem: die Zahlung für die Nutzungsüberlassung, typischerweise periodisch, stets nutzungszeitab…

[German Version] I. Concept – II. Legal Aspects – III. Economics – IV. Non-Christian Antiquity – V. Bible – VI. Christianity – VII. Judaism – VIII. Islam I. Concept Interest is payment in exchange for a right of use or exploitation, typically on a temporary basis and always agreed for a fixed period of time. Money later gained increasing importance as an object of lending and now occupies a dominant position, although other items or rights remain possible as objects of lending, as for example rent. In economics (see III below), this mutual commitment between the conferral…