> There is an income threshold—EUR 5,175 per month or EUR 62,100 (as of 2024), at which the percentage contribution is capped. What this means is that if your income increases, then this percentage remains fixed and doesn’t change with your salary increase.
Germany has a quite progressive tax scheme and the brackets are designed to be complementary, so that as income raises the pension and health benefits are capped while the general income tax grows more aggressively up to a total taxation rate around 45% for high incomes.
This is more than you would pay in the US but it includes both free healthcare for the rest of your life and a livable state pension after 67, and you get those benefits even if worse comes to worst and you suffer an accident, major disability etc. This is powerful social safety net that can't really be compared with what the American federal + state + private insurance offer you in return as benefits for your total tax+healthcare contribution.