Finance Administration

The National Socialist Finance Administration was as systematic as it was meticulous in carrying out the financial looting of the Jews, starting from the Reich Ministry of Finance at the top over the 26 subordinate Oberfinanzpräsidien (Superior Finance Presidiums) down to the almost 1000 tax offices and 200 customs bureaus. The Munich Oberfinanzpräsidium and the Munich tax offices were also involved in the gigantic raid against the German Jews. The ‘Reich Flight Tax’ amounting to 25 percent of the assets and the ‘Jewish wealth contribution’ imposed on November 12, 1938 were essential tools. These measures alone made 2 billion Reichsmarks for the German tax authorities.

In addition, the Nazi regime developed the foreign exchange legislation into an instrument of looting. This meant that emigrants were not allowed to take more than ten Reichsmarks in cash, and when changing Reichsmarks into other foreign currencies, the German state pocketed an ever-increasing proportion. The retained percentage increased from 20 to 81 between 1934 and 1936; from 1939 onwards, the Third Reich ultimately withheld 96 percent of the transfer amounts. Victor Klemperer, who was persecuted as a Jew, summed it up: On November 28, 1938, he noted in his diary that they would only let him leave Germany ‘stark naked’ (Klemperer, p. 437).
Like their colleagues all over the Third Reich, the officers in the Munich Finance Administration also meticulously implemented ordinances for looting the Jews and generally made rigorous use of their leeway, to the detriment of the persecuted Jews.