Angela Merkel new German Chancellor

[mears]

Something of a historical moment. The First female Chancellor of Germany and a East German as well.

It seems her position is not very strong as Schroeder's opposition party gets half the seats in her new cabinent.
http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=82491

Germany has put off its problems for quite some time now. Anemic growth, high unemployment, ( hovering around 11 or 12% ) high taxes and a pension system that will absord many more retirees in the coming future. She will need to take on the unions who fight for the status quo, those unions
who represent those lucky ones fortunate to have a job with all those snazy benefits.

The work week must be extended. German business must be able to hire and fire workers without burdensome red tape and large penalties. The days of German government mandating more than two weeks of paid vacation time must also come to an end.

You got to get the people working. Make it easier for companies to hire workers. Time to get on with it.

Good luck to her

 

[Isambard]

errrrrm.............

............you have no idea do you?

 

[kropotnik]

This September Germany had a trade surplus of $17 billion. The US had a trade deficit of, err $66 billion. Seems like the German economy is managing to compete rather well, even with is red tape and regulations. Maybe the US could learn a few things from them...

 

[Isambard]

It seems her position is not very strong as Schroeder's opposition party gets half the seats in her new cabinent.

FACT: The SPD is NOT the opposition but is a part of the German Federal Government and arguably in the stronger position.

FACT: The opposition is comprised of the Greens, the FDP neo-liberals and the LeftParty (socialists, to an extent radical and revolutionary) representing around 30% of German citizens.

FACT: The CDU/CSU had a lead over the SPD in September's elections by a couple of percentage points despite a years long media campaign against them.

FACT: The CDU/CSU bloc has a mere 4 seat lead in the Bundestag over the SPD and is unable itself to form a government, even with the FDP.

FACT: The CDU / CSU is wracked with internal divisions.

 

[mears]

FACT: The SPD is NOT the opposition but is a part of the German Federal Government and arguably in the stronger position.

FACT: The opposition is comprised of the Greens, the FDP neo-liberals and the LeftParty (socialists, to an extent radical and revolutionary) representing around 30% of German citizens.

FACT: The CDU/CSU had a lead over the SPD in September's elections by a couple of percentage points despite a years long media campaign against them.

FACT: The CDU/CSU bloc has a mere 4 seat lead in the Bundestag over the SPD and is unable itself to form a government, even with the FDP.

FACT: The CDU / CSU is wracked with internal divisions.

Great, an expert! What do you think or Mrs. Merkel? Will she be able to reform the labour system, take on the Unions? Can she make a dent in the unemployment rate. Make life better for those second and third generation Gernman immigrats from places like Turkey?

Lets talk Germany

 

[kropotnik]

Great, an expert! What do you think or Mrs. Merkel? Will she be able to reform the labour system, take on the Unions? Can she make a dent in the unemployment rate. Make life better for those second and third generation Gernman immigrats from places like Turkey?

Lets talk Germany

I would rather be unemployed in Germany and getting decent benefits and training for another job than being forced to take some shitty McJob with no future, because my benefits have run out and its that or starving. And the Germans manage to provide this enviable welfare state while running a massive trade surplus with the rest of the world. Seems like their economy is in pretty good shape to me.

 

[Isambard]

Great, an expert! What do you think or Mrs. Merkel?

Cold and boring. She got to the top through patronage of Kohl and being ruthless. It is partly sexism but she is widely despised in her party.

Will she be able to reform the labour system, take on the Unions?

The notion that the labour market needs to be changed and the unions weakened is debateable in itself.

There is really no mandate for the neo-liberal "reforms" ie butchery that you would like and the CDU/CSU and FDP offered the electorate. A majority of the electorate voted SPD/Green/LeftParty.

The indications are that although some things will change (for the worse) the will and ability to follow a much more radical neo-liberal course is not there.

Can she make a dent in the unemployment rate?

In specific sectors and regions unemployment is a serious issue in Germany. But it is overplayed becasue the system is transparent and honest without the hidden unemplyment / underemployment in Britain or USA.

A further brutalisation of the welfare state (and it isn't as generous as many believe) is possible to try and force the unemployed into EUR 1 an hour jobs and the like but not hugely likely I think.

A slightly weakened Euro helps exports which is good but major issue is increasing domestic demand and here the new government is doing its utter best to strangle it: VAT rises, tax rises, cutting of public sector pay already announced.

Make life better for those second and third generation Gernman immigrats from places like Turkey?

No intention of doing so. Immigrants, even in the 3rd and 4th generation are generally not citizens, excluded from the political process apart from serving as a scapegoat and so are irrelevent to her.

Her party has opposed attempts to make citizenship easier or to have Turkey in the EU

 

[Isambard]

I would rather be unemployed in Germany and getting decent benefits.

Don't believe the hype mate, dole after a year for a single person is the same as UK at around £60 a week + housing benefit. OK, cost of living is slightly cheaper than UK but still........

 

[nino_savatte]

Great, an expert! What do you think or Mrs. Merkel? Will she be able to reform the labour system, take on the Unions? Can she make a dent in the unemployment rate. Make life better for those second and third generation Gernman immigrats from places like Turkey?

Lets talk Germany

Why?

 

[mears]

I would rather be unemployed in Germany and getting decent benefits and training for another job than being forced to take some shitty McJob with no future, because my benefits have run out and its that or starving. And the Germans manage to provide this enviable welfare state while running a massive trade surplus with the rest of the world. Seems like their economy is in pretty good shape to me.

Sorry you feel to good to dignify working at a place like Mc Donalds, guess its better to sit around and watch TV. Lets soemone else pay for my laziness and pride.

Its pitiful but you can get away with it if someone is always there to pay your benefits. Cash doesn't grow on trees. Germany is getting increasingly old. There are fewer and fewer workers who will pay taxes which go to support the oldies and unemployed. Change is inevitable. Either now or later.

 

[mears]

Cold and boring. She got to the top through patronage of Kohl and being ruthless. It is partly sexism but she is widely despised in her party.




The notion that the labour market needs to be changed and the unions weakened is debateable in itself.

There is really no mandate for the neo-liberal "reforms" ie butchery that you would like and the CDU/CSU and FDP offered the electorate. A majority of the electorate voted SPD/Green/LeftParty.

The indications are that although some things will change (for the worse) the will and ability to follow a much more radical neo-liberal course is not there.





In specific sectors and regions unemployment is a serious issue in Germany. But it is overplayed becasue the system is transparent and honest without the hidden unemplyment / underemployment in Britain or USA.

A further brutalisation of the welfare state (and it isn't as generous as many believe) is possible to try and force the unemployed into EUR 1 an hour jobs and the like but not hugely likely I think.

A slightly weakened Euro helps exports which is good but major issue is increasing domestic demand and here the new government is doing its utter best to strangle it: VAT rises, tax rises, cutting of public sector pay already announced.




No intention of doing so. Immigrants, even in the 3rd and 4th generation are generally not citizens, excluded from the political process apart from serving as a scapegoat and so are irrelevent to her.

Her party has opposed attempts to make citizenship easier or to have Turkey in the EU

Thanks for the insight. But I would say the welfare state in places like Germany and France will sink if not changed. Demographic realities mean change is on the way

 

[Isambard]

Perhaps if the super rich were not allowed to opt out of the system.........

Anyone in Germany earning over about £ 25K (US $ 40 K ) can at least partially opt out of the public welfare system. A lot of senior civil servants are also exempted from paying into the pension system and as they have a LOT of influence in parliament this is unlikely to change.

 

[bugsy7]

Perhaps if the super rich were not allowed to opt out of the system.........

Anyone in Germany earning over about £ 25K (US $ 40 K ) can at least partially opt out of the public welfare system. A lot of senior civil servants are also exempted from paying into the pension system and as they have a LOT of influence in parliament this is unlikely to change.

I think you'll find that ALL civil servants (Beamte) in Germany pay no contributions to the pension system. The problem is that the group of "Beamte" encompasses not only those working in gobment offices, but also includes the German Old Bill, teachers, university lecturers etc. It's a massive group. They are also unsackable.
But I agree that the situation is unlikely to change anytime soon.

MsG

 

[Poi E]

With Germany's massive export growth, no radical solutions are required IMO (nor do they look likely to happen. Go coalition governments and MMP.) A (xenophobic) article was on the BBC Paxman thingey last night, with the fuckwit economics editor making the usual jibes at Germans and stating that the massive amount of retail spending in the UK compared to Germany showed that Brits have more fun. Er, no, just that personal debt in the UK is absolutely enourmous.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Judging Germany purely on the strength of a handful of statistics (most of which have external influencing factors which don't get mentioned) is daft.

IMHO Merkel (and indeed any Chancellor over the next 15 or so years) has taken up a poisoned chalice insofar as the structural factors influencing Germany's supposed "poor performance" (re-unification and its' concomitant ongoing costs especially) will militate against it being able to conform to the neo-liberal pattern certain ideologues would wish it to.

Merkel is going to have very hard work trimming the German economic sails to fit to the ideal wished for by the likes of the WTO, and which economies such as the USA and the UK have moved toward with part and wholesale privatisation of public sector functions. I doubt she will succeed.

 

[ViolentPanda]

With Germany's massive export growth, no radical solutions are required IMO (nor do they look likely to happen. Go coalition governments and MMP.) A (xenophobic) article was on the BBC Paxman thingey last night, with the fuckwit economics editor making the usual jibes at Germans and stating that the massive amount of retail spending in the UK compared to Germany showed that Brits have more fun. Er, no, just that personal debt in the UK is absolutely enourmous.

I still reckon Germany has a hard road ahead until it manages to "equalise" the ongoing disparities between "east" and "west", but I also feel that any reform along the "neo-liberal" line would cause the kind of social fractures that could activate particular political tensions that the German "establishment" would prefer to avoid.

 

[Isambard]

Yes Bugsy, I used term "senior" as the concept of "Beamte" doesn't exist in English.

They comprise about half if not more of the Bundestags seats.
Their position is enshrined in the constituion and as that needs 2/3 of the Bundestag to change it........

But they have less control over some aspects of their job.
Federal beamte have just had a 50% cut in Xmas bonuses without discussion.

 

[Poi E]

I still reckon Germany has a hard road ahead until it manages to "equalise" the ongoing disparities between "east" and "west", but I also feel that any reform along the "neo-liberal" line would cause the kind of social fractures that could activate particular political tensions that the German "establishment" would prefer to avoid.

Completely agree with this.

Didn't Kohl's government throw East German businesses onto the market without any form of protection? Reap what you sow.

 

[Streathamite]

Great, an expert! What do you think or Mrs. Merkel? Will she be able to reform the labour system, take on the Unions? Can she make a dent in the unemployment rate. Make life better for those second and third generation Gernman immigrats from places like Turkey?

Lets talk Germany

he fucking LIVES there, you clown! has done so for over a decade.
gets me my absinthe every time he's back in Albion.



<nudges isambard meaningfully>

 

[ViolentPanda]

Completely agree with this.

Didn't Kohl's government throw East German businesses onto the market without any form of protection? Reap what you sow.

Well, only those businesses that didn't get appropriated via "sweetheart deals" by the west and east German establishments, and those that weren't shut down overnight on (frequently spurious) environmental grounds that were more to do with blocking competition with established w/G businesses (Praktica and their Carl Zeiss Jena lenses being an example, as their products had always shown up Carl Zeiss Wetzlar as being over-priced and over-rated)

 

[ViolentPanda]

he fucking LIVES there, you clown! has done so for over a decade.
gets me my absinthe every time he's back in Albion.



<nudges isambard meaningfully>

Ah, such subtlety!

 

[nino_savatte]

he fucking LIVES there, you clown! has done so for over a decade.
gets me my absinthe every time he's back in Albion.



<nudges isambard meaningfully>

Trust mears - eh? The next conversation between him and Isambard should be interesting...that's if mears has the guts to come back.

 

[Streathamite]

Ah, such subtlety!

weeell, don't see him that often...

 

[Streathamite]

Trust mears - eh? The next conversation between him and Isambard should be interesting...that's if mears has the guts to come back.

I'm surprised isambard ain't duffed him on this;

But I would say the welfare state in places like Germany and France will sink if not changed. Demographic realities mean change is on the way

as my guess is mears has as much detailed and intimate knowledge of the German system/economy/welfare state as I do of aussie rules football 9i.e. stuff all)

 

[ViolentPanda]

as my guess is mears has as much detailed and intimate knowledge of the German system/economy/welfare state as I do of aussie rules football 9i.e. stuff all)

He appears to get a lot of his info from "the economist", which while it has good solid journalism has never pretended to be anything other than pro-market and (increasingly) pro neo-liberal reform.
I've been reading it on and off for 25 years, and it has pretty much always pushed the right-centric line, from monetarism to "trickle down" through structural adjustment policies to WTO to MAI and GATTS. Its' saving grace is its' reasonable amount of willingness to publish dissident views alongside the consensus. In that way it is similar to "hard science" publications.

Think of mears as a parrot. Unfortunately not an ex-parrot, but a live one.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Trust mears - eh? The next conversation between him and Isambard should be interesting...that's if mears has the guts to come back.

Perhaps he'll do that trick where he waits for his comments to "fall off the page" before rejoining the thread?

 

[Dhimmi]

Does anyone know if she's related to the Merkel gunsmithing family from Suhl?

 

[TeeJay]

Don't believe the hype mate, dole after a year for a single person is the same as UK at around £60 a week + housing benefit. OK, cost of living is slightly cheaper than UK but still........

This quote is from a 2004 article:

...Even compared with those in other generous countries (see chart), out-of-work Germans are well protected. People who lose their jobs get unemployment benefit of 60% of their previous earnings (or 67% if they have children) for up to 32 months. After that, payments drop to between 53% and 57%, but have no time limit. By this stage, payments are known as Arbeitslosenhilfe, or unemployment aid. Add in other perks, like family and housing benefits, and it is easy to see why workers with few skills—making up over half the unemployed—eschew badly paid jobs.

To change this, Hartz IV will shorten the period of unemployment benefit to 12 months (or 18 months for those over 55) and do away with the second phase of unemployment aid. Instead, the long-term unemployed will receive a flat-rate benefit, means-tested and paid only to those who seek work seriously. On average, benefits for single people living in western Germany will be €345 ($422) a month; for those in the east, the level will be €331 plus rent and heating allowances...

source

Have these changes come in now? Are unemployment benefits based on a percentage of your previous salary or are they flat-rate now?

 

[TAE]

How many people here have even heard of Hartz 4?

 

[TeeJay]

Probably not many but there were massive protests about it IIRC and I'd have thought that Isambard would know about it.