He is referring to health insurance for a self-employing person and a special fee which has to be paid for consumption of TV and radio stations comparing to Great Britain's BBC - see this wikipedia page for a list while I continue to look for the English term for those stations. ;)
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_öffentlich-rechtlichen_HD-Programme_in_Europa

You could go unnoticed by the company who collects the fee for some time but they have started to buy address data some years ago.

And being self-employed with a small business in Germany takes a lot of the earned money from anyone working and living this way.
Some weeks ago, other Germans here already opted for getting him employed for some time to overcome the financial struggle. I don't remember how this discussion ended.