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Germany creates 'super–high-tech ministry' for research, technology, aerospace
- johndoe0815 1y agoAnd it will probably be headed by one of the most incompetent and corrupt politicians they were able to find. Disgusting.
- pmags 1y agoEvidence? Citations? Suggested reading?
- bell-cot 1y ago> The agreement stipulates that the CSU will be in charge of the “super–high-tech ministry,” as party leader Markus Söder called it in a press conference this week. The CSU has not proposed a minister yet, but it’s widely expected that Dorothee Bär, who was in charge of “digital infrastructure” in previous governments under former Chancellor Angela Merkel, will get the nod. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothee_B%C3%A4r https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothee_B%C3%A4r Sounds like her only non-political experience is working as a journalist. It's arguable that the "corrupt" part was scrubbed off Wikipedia. But her credentials to lead a research / technology / aerospace ministry certainly sound underwhelming.
- _dain_ 1y ago>who was in charge of “digital infrastructure” in previous governments germany's digital infrastructure is a global laughing stock, this doesn't bode well.
- johannes1234321 1y agoThat's more a mistranslation of the role. Digital infrastructure was part of traffic ministry. Her role was coordinating the government's mostly internal digital strategy. Thus reviewing new bills, looking at processes inside the administration etc. most of the work outside the public eye.
- DeepSeaTortoise 1y agoYou're claiming this, but average German internet speed has but recently surpassed Latvia's, easily beats Paraguay and the Philippines and is closing in on Montenegro and Barbados. The recent rapid improvements even diminished Romania's lead to less than 250%. Of course this is only up to the Telekom speedtest server, beyond that nearly all of Germany's 50-100Tbps get funneled through 362Gbps of interconnections onto the open internet.
- johndoe0815 1y agoGerman only, sorry. Both are reputable news outlets (though the Spiegel has gone down quite a bit in recent years IMHO). https://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2013-04/baer-csu-gehaltsaffaere https://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2013-04/baer-csu-geh... https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/csu-politikerin-dorothee-baer-beschaeftigte-spaeteren-ehemann-als-mitarbeiter-a-896982.html https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/csu-politikerin-d... She hired her future husband as an employee until immediately before their wedding. This position was paid by the federal German parliament, i.e. the taxpayer. It's illegal to hire a relative in such a position.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- johannes1234321 1y agoI don't think grandparent's characterization matches. Typical career oriented "conservative" politician. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothee_B%C3%A4r https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothee_B%C3%A4r
- ndr42 1y agoThe CSU has a history of putting people in charge that do not benefit germany but bavaria (the only part of germany where the party CSU is active), e.g. Andreas Scheuer [1][2]. Notable recent examples of corruption are the Maskenaffäre [4] or Julia Klöckner and Nestlé ("Julia Klöckner and Nestlé show how the greasy closeness between politics and business can go too far" [5]). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Scheuer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Scheuer: "Scheuer's ministry is said to have broken budgetary and public procurement law when concluding the multi-billion dollar contracts with the operators and "deliberately deceived" the Bundestag about the real costs of the car toll." [2] Söder (party leader of CSU) said about Scheuer: "I don't know not many ministers that bring so much money to bavaria as Andreas Scheuer" [3] [3] German: "Bei allem, was der ein oder andere kritisiert an dem Andi Scheuer: Ich kenne wenige Minister, die so viel Geld nach Bayern holen, wie der Andi Scheuer. Auch das muss man einfach mal in der Bilanz ehrlicherweise bitte nach draußen sagen." [4] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maskenaffäre https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maskenaffäre 5] https://www.spiegel.de/politik/julia-kloeckner-und-nestle-zeigen-wo-die-schmierige-naehe-zwischen-politik-und-wirtschaft-zu-weit-geht-a-0974bf16-1e24-495c-bac8-de07e5976af0 https://www.spiegel.de/politik/julia-kloeckner-und-nestle-ze...
- selfmodruntime 1y agoThis ministry will not be lead by any of these people. Their replacement isn't that much better competency wise, but there is no corruption case yet. Your source 3 is not saying what you think it does. State government can apply for federal funding. Söder and his ilk have mastered this. There is nothing corrupt here.
- ndr42 1y agoI read a commemt in this discussion that Dorothee Bär has a case of corruption where she was employing her husband. „Source 3“: Well, if you are a minister for infrastructure in germany it is not part of our job description to bring money to bavaria. Maybe my definition of corruption is of but the minister has some saying in how to use its funds and if your home state benefits more than other parts of germany… I would call this a form of corruption
- renewiltord 1y agoNothing surprising about Germany excelling at its strongest fields: creating ministries. Accretive policy is strong there and in their Anglo-Saxon descendants.
- FirmwareBurner 1y agoExcelling at creating paperwork... except now digitally. AUTOSAR is may favorite German software innovation. /s That's the curse in Europe. Every European country has it's own ministry of digital innovation who's role is the grift of allocating taxpayer money to the right politically connected pockets while pretending to do innovation. Case in point, German fiber optic infrastructure is still lightyears behind Romania despite much higher costs. Means, somebody in Germany is making good money form that, even if there's nothing to show for. Meanwhile the actuality innovative companies in Europe get real VC money from the US, then get incorporated in the US and become American companies, then EU has the audacity to complain about lacking tech sovereignty.
- tommica 1y agoYep, had a coworker who was looking for financing in a EU country, but very few investor options were available, and mostly for a low amount of money, only enough for a few months. He had to go to UK to find people with deep enough pockets.
- WorkerBee28474 1y agoYou can replace 'Europe' with 'Canada' and everything said here will still be true.
- lifestyleguru 1y ago> Case in point, German fiber optic infrastructure is still lightyears behind Romania despite much higher costs. Means, somebody in Germany is making good money form that, even if there's nothing to show for. Apartment I stayed in while in Germany had annual Kabelgebühr of 100 EUR. It was not related with the ISP internet subscription of course. Any negotiations or questions were responded with "IT'S KABELGEBÜHR YOU HAVE TO PAY IT".
- submeta 1y agoMany German companies want „Digitalisierung“, workflow automation, process improvements, they want to use AI, LLMs, but when it comes to implementing all of that, they are drowning in bureaucracy. What Germans can do is create layers of bureaucracy.
- hobofan 1y agoYeah, I'm sure a thousand lovely Horizon 2040 funded research projects that result in throwaway academic solutions to hyper-specific industry issues where the first MVP is shown after 5 years will come out of this.
- nextos 1y agoNot even throwaway. They will result in reports and keynote presentations, but nothing truly functional. The EU doesn't understand how to structure incentives to make things work and avoid rent-seekers and grifters. Source, I've been part of some large EU consortia. Never again.
- markus_zhang 1y agoReminds me of a quote from "Yes minister" in which it says one commissioner pays a farmer a lot of money to produce and another to remove the surplus, plus a lot of paper pushing in the middle.
- twothreeone 1y agoYeah, I was always surprised by how many organizations will actually jump at the opportunity to "participate" when some EU consortia was announcing a new program or funding round. There's a saying for that in German involving "feeding trough" and "pigs".
- thinkindie 1y agoLOL - I can second that. There are a lot of memes about nothing screams more "Digitalisierung!" than having to send papers via fax. Or having to carry cash coz a lot of places don't even give you the option to pay by card (even though this seems to come to an end, hello 2025!)
- odiroot 1y agoWaiting eagerly for the first contracts to land at SAP/T-Mobile.
- lifestyleguru 1y agoThey will swallow and maul any budget you throw at them. Legally and fully documented.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- coolgoose 1y agoNo fax ? :P
- black_13 1y ago[dead]
- fxtentacle 1y agoThe upside is that this will actually provide lots of research funding to small companies. Think of it like the seed round from a VC, but instead of investing into new companies, they try to strategically invest into existing companies to boost future tax revenue. It'll probably be very German, meaning overly bureaucratic. But the basic idea of financing R&D in small companies to grow them more competitive seems legit to me. As an example of what was funded by similar German government grants, you can look at voize, which is (by now) also a YC company: https://en.voize.de/uber-uns https://en.voize.de/uber-uns EDIT: Here's some German info on the 1.98 mio € research grant from early 2022 (meaning it was awarded shortly before they joined the W22 YC batch): https://www.interaktive-technologien.de/projekte/pysa https://www.interaktive-technologien.de/projekte/pysa
- selfmodruntime 1y agoApplying for a grant is normally difficult. In Germany, it's outright hellish. I hope I will be pleasantly surprised.
- franze 1y agothe good thing now with AI you can write all those pages of bullshit nobody reads bit you will accountable to if things dont work out
- fxtentacle 1y agoIt's boring but otherwise harmless. You skim through 20 pages of legalese and fill out the blanks. Your local goverment office has an advisor who will check the forms together with you before you submit them. (I applied for and received a De-Minimis grant.) Plus for the larger grant types, there are advisory companies that work on commission.
- timmg 1y agoFinally: a good use for LLMs ;)
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- notorandit 1y agoThey need to call Mrs. Merkel back.
- kazinator 1y agoCool, scientists persecuted in the USA can now free to Germany. Kind of like Einstein & Co, but exact opposite direction.
- sunshine-o 1y ago> A new ministry for research, technology, and aerospace will be formed, and the education portfolio will be taken over by the current ministry for family, seniors, women, and youth. So I guess Germany is one of those countries which reorganize their government on a brainstorming board by just throwing up concepts. And then it takes years for all the bureaucracy to move around and get back to work. > Germany needs a new alignment of defense policy and research policy, but “we do not yet know how to do this,” I learned in middle school that you were once really good at it. There is also a consensus it got quickly out of control and destroyed Europe. All of this sound more like an Onion or Babylon Bee piece...
- anigbrowl 1y agoBlack_13 appears to be shadowbanned so I'm reproducing their comment here: black_13 11 minutes ago [dead] | parent | context | unvouch | favorite | on: Germany creates 'super–high-tech ministry' for res... The cynicism in these comments is telling, but misses crucial realities about Germany's capabilities and social achievements. Yes, Germany creates bureaucracies. Yes, Dorothee Bär's digital infrastructure record isn't impressive. And yes, German bureaucracy can be stifling. But this myopic focus on administrative inefficiency overlooks Germany's formidable strengths. Germany maintains world-class engineering and manufacturing excellence through their Mittelstand network while America has hollowed out its industrial base. German research institutions like Max Planck and Fraunhofer consistently produce breakthrough innovations in renewable energy, advanced materials, and chemical engineering. Their aerospace contributions through Airbus and DLR deliver real technological advances. More importantly, Germany excels precisely where America falters. Their dual education system creates exceptional technical competence without requiring college degrees. Germans enjoy comprehensive public transportation infrastructure, universal healthcare without administrative bloat, and urban planning that prioritizes livability over speculation. The results speak for themselves: Germans live significantly longer (81.1 years vs America's 76.4), face virtually no gun violence (2 deaths per million annually vs America's 120), and don't suffer from the manufactured scarcity that plagues American housing, healthcare, and education markets. Critically, Germany isn't now teetering on becoming a police state. While America expands surveillance powers, militarizes police forces, and faces growing authoritarianism, Germany's post-war constitutional framework continues to prioritize civil liberties, privacy protections, and democratic norms. Their painful historical lessons have created institutional guardrails against authoritarianism that America increasingly lacks. Let's be honest about who's posting these dismissive takes - primarily privileged tech workers disconnected from the material realities faced by average citizens. While you mock German bureaucracy from comfortable positions, their social systems deliver concrete benefits that many Americans can only dream of. Germany's approach allows for longer, healthier lives with dramatically less precarity than what Americans experience. Their new ministry may face bureaucratic challenges, but it builds on foundations of technical excellence and social achievement that deserve genuine consideration rather than facile mockery.
- Aldipower 1y ago
- pasabagi 1y agoI actually think Germany would be really good at digital infrastructure if they stopped being afraid of friend computer. Germany is immensely proud of its history of creating standards - there's literally a place in berlin called DIN Platz. Germany is also very proud, and rightly so, in its history of mathematical innovation. Everything that isn't dross in the computer world is either a well designed standard, or a well designed algorithm. If the German government adopted a sensible standard for government documents, for example, and mandated that all documents must be saved in it, that would already make a huge difference.
- fxtentacle 1y agoWe actually have a rather recent government agency called "DigitalHub" for that, too, which has been quite successful at pushing open standards and open source. Then there's https://zendis.de/#produkte https://zendis.de/#produkte whose sole purpose is to replace non-EU closed-source software, for example by replacing Windows + Office with Linux and the custom desktop software suite https://opendesk.eu/ https://opendesk.eu/
- ZeWaka 1y agoopenSUSE!
- fabianholzer 1y agoYes, and zendis in its very German ways only hires folks who commute to Bochum at least three times a week. Home office? Da könnte ja jeder kommen...
- selfmodruntime 1y ago> I actually think Germany would be really good at digital infrastructure if they stopped being afraid of friend computer. They still have the automotive / electrical engineering mindset on computers and software. Software in Germany is built to achieve a means to an end. It is never the end goal itself.
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- LargoLasskhyfv 1y ago[flagged]
- slt2021 1y agoGermany has no national idea, they have no reason why an average burger should work his/her ass off competing with Chinese/American/Indian scientists and working 80 hr/week on cutting edge research. Germans are smart and capable, but the German lifestyle is not for "super high tech" industry
- tene80i 1y agoWhat’s your proposal? Give up?
- selfmodruntime 1y agoWe should stop treating any kind of patriotism and German culture like it is from the devil.
- eli_gottlieb 1y agoSounds like you kinda just want an excuse to vote AfD without pointing to an element of their policy platform you think the rest of us should support too.
- selfmodruntime 1y agoQ.E.D (Just for the record I don't vote AfD. I do like being German and I like what little culture we have left. You can be patriotic and at the same time left leaning.)
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- eli_gottlieb 1y agoOk, so what policies do you like about BWS, then?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- ericyd 1y agoWhat's with the mis-matched hyphens/dashes?
- guywithahat 1y agoThe more I read about this, the more it feels like a VW bailout. If you want innovation, make it easier to start up and shut down research companies, you don't need a new ministry to hand out taxpayer money to companies.
- amadeuspagel 1y agoIs that just based on the quote from the Volkswagen Foundation? But that foundation is entirely independent of VW and doesn't get any taxpayer money in any case.
- flanked-evergl 1y agoAnd the win goes to China, as always. Well played.
- whimsicalism 1y agoSurprised to see the negativity in the comments - if executed well, this is exactly the sort of thing governments should be aiming to do: solving social coordination problems and funding with long-term horizons.
- franze 1y ago*executed well* but first regulated to death
- thinkingtoilet 1y agoYou say that like Germany as a country isn't doing well. I swear, people just stop thinking when it comes to things like this.
- whimsicalism 1y agoI think the EU is increasingly aware of its faults, especially in Germany & France. Happy to watch them cook and I say that as an American who has watched on with pain at what the EU has done to itself over the last decade+.
- analog31 1y agoAre their people worse off?
- whimsicalism 1y agoIn my view, yes - especially when you subset to native born populations. Many europeans are a proud people though so I understand this is contentious, regardless of what the numbers say.
- vondur 1y agoAccording to this article, the answer is yes: https://www.wsj.com/world/europeans-poorer-inflation-economy-255eb629 https://www.wsj.com/world/europeans-poorer-inflation-economy...
- franze 1y agoyeah, who still remembers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaero https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaero the German-French initiative against Google. A European search engine. In the end Technicolor / Thomson, Exalead, SAP, France Telecom (Orange) got most of the funding if I remember right. Other than a few university, museum digitalisation projects nothing consumer facing ever so the light of day.
- Woodi 1y agoBecause all that EU "initiatives" is form of scam and just media noise.
- ulrischa 1y agoThis will not work. Germany is totally driven by lawyers. No room for new ideas. Everybody is doing ass covering instead of working together building something great
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- nixass 1y ago> also plans to woo scientists from abroad but also god forbid you arrive to Germany with <C1 German. ABH office is waiting with guns fully loaded
- onecommentman 1y agoThe phrase “super-high-tech ministry” doesn’t sound like the correctly nuanced translation of Super-Hightech-Ministeriums. In English, it begs the question whether they are really serious — why isn’t it “super-duper-high-tech” or “ultra-high-tech” or “hyper-high-tech”? Calling something “super-X” in English sounds a little marketingspeak-clumsy and opens you up to these jibes.
- gillesjacobs 1y agoI need an LLM in my fax machine.
- holowoodman 1y ago> “Our goal is that the world’s first fusion reactor should be realized in Germany,” This will never happen. At some point they will notice that fusion is something with "nuclear" and "atoms" and they will immediately jump to "scary", "dangerous" and "verboten".
- Ridius 1y agoGermany is home to one of the most promising Fusion projects - "Wendelstein 7-X "
- holowoodman 1y agoGermany also was home to some of the most cutting edge fission research. Otto Hahn (the ship, not the guy), THTR-300, EPR, SNR-300, ... All gone now.
- selfmodruntime 1y agoOf course, there is more fusion research now.
- selfmodruntime 1y agoThey are also a large supporter of ITER.
- arghandugh 1y agoThis is a militarization effort to counter Mad King Trump who has overthrown the USA and is threatening the global order for his own sick pleasure.
- dpc_01234 1y agoEuropean research and innovation funding is absurdly gamed and just money wasted.
- teleforce 1y agoCitation needed [1]: [1] Wikipedian Protester: https://xkcd.com/285/ https://xkcd.com/285/
- dpc_01234 1y agoI personally know people who received funding from EU innovation funds, thought more than 10 years ago. It was graded by bureaucrats that had no idea about anything and graded it based on keyword matching (basically like tech recruiting works). It was absurd.
- piombisallow 1y agoJust one more ministry bro, I beg you, just one more ministry and we solve European growth, a couple more bureaucrats, c'mon
- MrBuddyCasino 1y agoThe plan is foolproof.
- pjio 1y agoThe title is strange: In german news there was nothing that sounded like "super hightech ministry" not even a "superhigh tech ministry". But the ministry for "education and research" got split, assigning education to the ministry for family, leaving more room for the research part which got an additional focus on technology.
- amadeuspagel 1y ago> In a section titled “scientific freedom,” the document seems to refer at least obliquely to developments in the United States, where scientists working on topics such as gender, global health, and climate change have seen their funding slashed and important data sets have been scrubbed from the websites of federal agencies. “Funding decisions will be based on science-driven criteria,” the document states. “It seems like that should be a no-brainer, but we have seen how quickly it can change,” says Eva Winkler, an oncologist and medical ethicist at Heidelberg University and a member of the German Ethics Council. If this obliquely refers to anything, then to a scandal under the last german government, where the minister of science and education had demanded to know whether any signatory to an open letter received funding from the ministry[1]. [1]: https://www.forschung-und-lehre.de/politik/foerdermittel-affaere-im-ausschuss-6495 https://www.forschung-und-lehre.de/politik/foerdermittel-aff...
- lifestyleguru 1y ago[flagged]
- flanked-evergl 1y ago[flagged]
- xxmarkuski 1y agoI agree that merging the technology division from the ministry of economic affairs (BMWK) to the new research ministry is a good step as both ministries have been large providers of funding. The BMBF funds DFG, as well as the large science organizations in Germany (Fhg, Mpg, ...), the BMWK has funded research which is closer to applications, of course looking to enable economic activity. I'm unsure why the ministry gets a special focus on aerospace, this topic is being worked on by the DLR, funded by BMBF. I'm also not yet sure what to think about splitting education and research. It goes against the Humboldtian Ideal, especially in the universitys both topics are connected. On the other hand, it might enable the ministries to be more focused and do reforms that don't depend on each other to be performed more quickly. The research ministry will go to CSU, the bavarian sister party of CDU. While it may not be very popular amongst many Germans, because CSU is seen as conservative and individual CSU politicians are not famous science policymakers, Bavaria is a successful science hub. Munich is home to international leading institutions (TUM, MPG, FhG). Bavaria is also a hub for aerospace with Aibus and MTU and startups like Isar Aerospace and Rocket Factory Augsburg. Maybe repeating what bavarian policymakers have done regionally to the whole of Germany will be good.
- Archelaos 1y ago> I'm also not yet sure what to think about splitting education and research. It goes against the Humboldtian Ideal, especially in the universitys both topics are connected. According to the German constitution (Grundgesetz), schools and universities are (mainly) the responsibility of the individual German states, not the federal government.[1] (A hybrid is the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology that has a university branch under the supervision of the state of Baden-Württemberg and a research centre branch under federal supervision.) The educational tasks of the federal government therefore basically relate to extracurricular and non-university education, such as early childhood education or adult further education. At the level of the individual states, higher education and research are generally combined in one ministry and school education in another. [1] Actually the Grundgesetz states in Art. 30: "The exercise of state powers and the performance of state duties shall be a matter for the individual states (Länder), unless otherwise provided for or permitted by this Basic Law." The authority of the federal government in education policy is therefore derived from what is explicitly mentioned in various places in the Basic Law. A short overview what that involves can be found here: https://www.bundestag.de/resource/blob/416682/db04b405a48dbe6e637b854ce5a2c198/wd-3-126-09-pdf-data.pdf https://www.bundestag.de/resource/blob/416682/db04b405a48dbe... (PDF, 2009, in German).
- KurSix 1y agoBut the real test will be follow-through. Big promises like "world's first fusion reactor" and wooing global talent sound great, but without a clear budget or streamlined bureaucracy, it risks becoming just another shiny headline
- timka 1y agoLooks like a last-ditch effort to salvage its crumbling technological sovereignty amid the EU's systemic crisis. Even if they invent something, production will happen in China or the US. Germany wants to preserve Airbus and stay relevant in European space programs, but without cheap energy and raw materials this is a pipe dream. Quantum computing/hydrogen is theoretically promising, but they're already behind China and the US. Trying to catch up to Russia in drones and EW, but without energy independence or microelectronics it won't work. Without Russian gas or nuclear power, high-tech manufacturing is unprofitable. Germany's best engineers are already in Shanghai and Silicon Valley. Russia/China/the US are sprinting ahead in hypersonics, AI, and 6G, while Germany is just forming a ministry. Germany's move isn't a breakthrough, it's desperation. They're trying to save face, but they lack energy for advanced tech w/o Russia, have no military shield w/o the US, can’t manufacture at scale w/o China.
- ashoeafoot 1y agoLets be honest for once -germany is deeply risk averse and conservative. Its leaders can try to cast that "we wamt that california culture" spell a million times and out hops another wirecard. You can not graft innovation cultures to conservation cultures . You would need to change the conservation culture at thr upbringing roots, by highlighting how pure conservation gets you into wars and other problems. By rewarding characters that want to go on a adventure .You can not tell the guy who wants to jump a mammoth with a pointy stick, that this is "toxic masculinity" and "the outstanding nail gets hammered" in kindergarden and open a ministry for elephant steak.
- justlikereddit 1y agoAnd what super high tech background will the ministers have? >Friend of The Merkler >Protested nuclear energy >Invited a million illiterates to an all-inclusive life in Germany, none who ever had an encounter with the technology of literacy And so forth.
- jdthedisciple 1y agoMinistries cannot keep up with the velocity of free market / startup culture like SV. So I wouldn't exactly be bullish on this.
- shafyy 1y agoWhat kind of comparison is this? A government ministry is not a private enterprise, it has different goals and structures. It's like saying a cargo ship can't keep up with a speed boat.
- jdthedisciple 1y agoWell let me put it this way: What is the point of the ministry, and why does the current global leader of super-high-tech (USA) not seem to be in need of such?
- jcarrano 1y agoI worked on a project funded by the BMBF. I can tell you, those people had no idea of what they were funding. And the people running the project had also no idea for what they were being funded.
- tete 1y agoSo basically like any funding?
- mkarliner 1y ago..?mmjnnm mmmmmm
- malthaus 1y agoi'm swiss living in berlin currently (leaving soon) germany is a country on the rapid decline. the recently decided investment effort and the new government are a step in the right direction but wont halt or revert that decline. the country needs a BIG shock and be rebuilt from the ground up. the new ministry is just pandering / virtue signalling and won't have any effect. some examples: 1) legacy financial holes like the pension scheme, no bandaid will save this 2) public workers safety & pension "beamtentum" - wrong incentives, wrong people, wrong mindset 3) workers rights are too strong (betriebsrat, unflexible hiring & firing) 4) taxes are ridiculously high, there's zero incentive for global talent to come here 5) bureaucracy is absolutely insane, a country run by risk averse lawyers stuck in the 1980s 6) immigration was botched so bad, they wont recover from this for another generation 7) the rise of the far right afd was handled so terribly, the trauma from ww2 is still too big to deal with it rationally, rather than calling the strongest party in the country "antidemocratic" (which ironically IS antidemocratic in itself). if they dont get a grip on this, afd will lead the country in 4 years. 8) no common identity / goal except for wanting to show being the "good guys", see misincentived sustainability initiatives, handling of israel / palestina, etc 9) weak leaders / politicians. they are all bureaucrats 10) regulation first, innovation never. see AI
- HellDunkel 1y ago[flagged]
- malthaus 1y ago[flagged]
- mk89 1y agoI like to believe that 16 years of Merkel left people with the inability of understanding politics and democracy in general. Handling AfD by inviting them to a talk show where the audience/presenters were mostly people with Greens/Left background is emblematic of how this country has been delegating the ability to think democratically to someone else. No wonder we have extreme parties on the rise. (Both Left and AfD are extremes, no matter what) Instead of listening, they made fun or criticized a party of monkeys that should have never reached 22%. Because that's all they could do. Make fun, minimize, claiming you're racist, etc. Burning Tesla factories, breaking their cars while they are parked, ... letting protesters glue themselves on the streets blocking you from reaching whichever place you planned to (be it an office or a hospital). This is daily life in Germany in the last 3-4 years. Wtf! I am personally sad that all the good things will change because the last 20 years I think Germany really became a great country, unlike all the criticism that people like to throw at it. All just because people couldn't confront the facts. And yes, this means making hard decisions where needed.
- Woodi 1y agoThat news just confirms EU is not a country-like and any federation is not ready. Funny that outsiders like US and Russia and probably others behave as it is one country :) It is kind of some "body" but not a well functioning one: fusion ? Unser! Spy satelites ? Notre!
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- egorfine 1y agoAs a person in the EU I would absolutely love to see changes in Germany and EU in general, but I have lost all faith in Germany's ability to fight bureaucracy.