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There is this sentence:

Allerdings müssen sie zwischen ein und zwei Prozent ihrer Sozialgelder für die Leistungen der Krankenkasse abgeben.

The deklination mit unbestimmtem Artikel for Genitiv Plural should be 'Geldern'. So it should be

... ihrer Sozialgeldern

isn't it?

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  • 1
    See verbformen.de/deklination/substantive/Geld.htm
    – RHa
    Commented Mar 17 at 15:22
  • @RHa In my example sentence, it's not 'der Gelder', but 'ihrer Gelder'. From what I have learnt, the declination of possessive pronoun is the same as that of indefinite article. From this table, it should be Geldern. –
    – Dennis
    Commented Mar 18 at 18:25
  • This table is highly dubious. There is no plural indefinite article in German, so the column for indefinite article and plural makes no sense to me. It might be interpreted as "no article plural" but Geldern as genitive plural just feels wrong to me as a native spreaker.
    – RHa
    Commented Mar 18 at 19:15
  • @RHa I think the plural indefinite article in that table applies to '-mein', '-kein' etc.
    – Dennis
    Commented Mar 18 at 21:17

1 Answer 1

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3

So it should be

... ihrer Sozialgeldern

isn't it?

No, it shouldn't and it isn't.

German Komposita (composite nouns) always retain the declination of their last part. "Sozialgeld" is built from two words: "sozial" ("social"), which is an Adjektiv/Adverb and "Geld" ("money", sometimes also "funds"), which is a Nomen (noun). So, the way "Sozialgeld" is declinated is like "Geld" is declinated. "Geld" is a bit irregular, here is a table:

das Geld (Nominativ singular)
des Geldes (Genitiv singular)
dem Geld (Dativ singular)
das Geld (Akkusativ singular)

die Gelder (Nominativ plural)
der Gelder (Genitiv plural)
den Geldern (Dativ plural)
die Gelder (Akkusativ plural)

Now we have to find out which case is used:

(Allerdings 1) (müssen 2) (sie 3) (zwischen ein und zwei Prozent ihrer Sozialgelder 4) (für 5) (die Leistungen der Krankenkasse 6) (abgeben 2a).

Nevertheless they have to give up between 1 and 2 percent of their social funds(?) for the services of their social security (provider).

  1. is the so-called Vorfeld, it translates to "nevertheless"
  2. and 2a) is the Prädikat, the Verb "abgeben" along with the Modalverb "müssen" - have to ... give up.
  3. is the subject of the sentence, "they"
  4. This is the interesting part. It is an Objekt in Akkusativ (they have to give up something) but consisting of the "core" object itself ("1 or 2 percent") and an Objekt of this Objekt, so to say. This "sub-object" is in Genitiv, the most common analogon to the english possessive: "ihrer Sozialgelder".
  5. introduces another Objekt, "for"
  6. is this other Objekt, also in Akkusativ and constructed the same way as 4: a main part in Akkusativ ("die Leistungen", the services) and a sub-part in Genitiv ("der Krankenkasse", "of the social security provider").
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  • First of all, thanks a lot for your detailed answer. In my example sentence, it's not 'der Gelder', but 'ihrer Gelder'. From what I have learnt, the declination of possessive pronoun is the same as that of indefinite article. From this table, it should be Geldern.
    – Dennis
    Commented Mar 18 at 17:06
  • @Dennis: no, it should not! Regardless of "ihrer Gelder" or "der Gelder", the Genitiv plural of "Geld" is "Gelder" and not "Geldern". You seem to think this is Dativ, but it is NOT! See under 4).
    – bakunin
    Commented Mar 18 at 18:50
  • No, I know it's genitive. But from that table, it's Geldern.
    – Dennis
    Commented Mar 18 at 21:16
  • 1
    @Dennis: This table is just plain wrong.The declination of the pronoun/adjective may change, but the noun is always inflected the same.
    – bakunin
    Commented Mar 19 at 3:37

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