A big part of the "German Miracle" is that while Germany got less money than Britain or France they assumed they'd have to pay all of it back and when they didn

A big part of the "German Miracle" is that while Germany got less money than Britain or France they assumed they'd have to pay all of it back and when they didn't, that created a massive windfall that was used to provide affordable loans to businesses and reconstruction efforts. The "KfW" still exists as a public credit bank today - most younger people aren't aware its name literally expands to "credit institute for reconstruction" in German. West Germany formally has a "social market economy" and while there have been pushes towards a "free market" economy those were largely the result of reforms from the 1980s onwards. I don't think "free markets" is a good explanation when looking at Germany vs Britain or France in the 1950s to 1970s.