Paying to be transported to death.

 

Killing the Jews wasn’t enough for the Nazi regime. They also needed to be humiliated. and their deaths had to be profitable. Laws were introduced to remove them from any social interaction and then they were forcibly removed from their homes, with only one suitcase of possessions, all other valuables were sold or just taken by Nazi officials.

Then when they were put on transport to the concentration camps or death camps(in my opinion they were all death camps, some camps just killed more on an industrial scale) They even had to pay for the train tickets.

The majority of Jews were made to pay for their own deportations, especially wherever passenger carriages were used. The payments were done in a way  of direct money deposit to the SS in relation to  the “resettlement to work in the East” myth. Charged in the ghettos for accommodation, adult Jews paid full price one-way tickets, the Nazis knew there would not be any return tickets.  Children under 12 years of age paid half price, and those under four did not have to pay. The Jews who no money left were typically  the first to be deported.

The SS would forward the monies to the German transport authority , to be paid to the Reichsbahn to finance and accommodate further transports.

In 2009 an expert report established on behalf of the German “Train of Commemoration” project, estimates that the Reichsbahn pocketed a €445,000,000 or $462,000,000. between 1938 and 1945.

The Reichsbahn weren’t the only ones to profit. The Dutch and French railways and other European rail companies also made money from the transports.

 

 

 

Sources

https://books.google.ie/books?id=IfoBx6skMCkC&redir_esc=y