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At this point it seems inevitable that most of Europe is going to experience severe economic struggles. Manufacturing in Germany is dying, making anything whic

At this point it seems inevitable that most of Europe is going to experience severe economic struggles. Manufacturing in Germany is dying, making anything which is cost competitive is impossible and the measures trying to fix it are miniscule compared to the magnitude of the problem.

dinkblam 10mo ago
> Manufacturing in Germany is dying no surprise given the high taxes, extreme energy prices, massive bureaucracy, ridiculous regulations, work-hating employees and extremely business-hostile culture
- cdmckay 10mo ago
  I think it’s mostly the loss of Nord Stream
  - AlexandrB 10mo ago
    It's the loss of Germany's last nuclear plants in 2023[1]. For a country supposedly aiming for net zero the shutdown of their nuclear infrastructure was a huge "own goal". Really sad to see. [1] https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-out-climate-intl https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-...
    - cenamus 10mo ago
      Strange that the share pf renewables has beem steadily increasing
  - Phil_Latio 10mo ago
    It's just one piece of the puzzle. The cost for Co2 certificates is a more major reason. Starting 2027, hedge funds can buy these certificates which will be the nail in the coffin. It's basically Bitcoin on steroids with the difference that people buy Bitcoin out of free will, while the industry is forced to buy these certificates which get more scarce over time.
    - aurelwu 10mo ago
      Anyone can already buy those certificates - but as its an artificial market where rules can be changed politically it's actually way more resistant to such things than regular markets, so if those hedge funds feel like they want to lose some billions they can certainly do that. There is a large enough stockpile of certificates + leeway when to submit them that any short term market squeeze will just be dealt with politically.
      - Phil_Latio 10mo ago
        This argument, namely that politics can lower the price (by emitting extra certificates) when it gets too high, contradicts the whole reason for the mechanism in the first place: They claim a free market can find the right price better than politicians. But then they interfer anyway? The price will rise much larger than a dumb, fixed increase-schedule would. Because the "market" wants it's profit.
  - mx7zysuj4xew 10mo ago
    This is it. A lot of people seem to be pushing some weird "anti-environmental" when the simple reality is that all energy costs I cannot understate the impact of Russian Energy being cut off. Right now we're paying roughly twice as much than we used to for compressed natural gas brought via tanker ships from the us. I genuinely believe that the war in Ukraine is mostly about energy dependence on Russia and Ukraine losing its transfer fees through their old pipelines
    - nwellnhof 10mo ago
      > I cannot understate the impact of Russian Energy being cut off. It's an interesting fact that Western Germany imported Russian gas since the early 1960s, throughout the cold war and in complete opposition to US interests. German Wikipedia has a nice overview: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geschichte_der_deutschen_Gasversorgung#Russisches_Erdgas https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geschichte_der_deutschen_Gasve...
pfannkuchen 10mo ago
Just stop trading manufactured products with Asia. Their people are still transitioning from agrarian hardship to urban factory life, and there seems to be a zeal that comes with this transition, a willingness to work hard for what here today would be considered little. Good for them. But in Europe we had this transition already and we became disillusioned with the lifestyle tradeoffs. Having our people do nothing productive while all of our life objects are made by others is not sustainable and it is awful for the morale of our peoples. It needs to be stopped.
- dinkblam 10mo ago
  > It needs to be stopped. forcing germans to buy everything at 10 times of what it costs now is not the way to rescue the country
  - pfannkuchen 10mo ago
    Can you please think through what would happen a bit further? What you say here is a first order analysis on a very short time scale. It does not capture the end state of such a change. The acceptable transition period for a change depends on the severity of the problem the change is targeting, and in this case here the problem is quite severe, so our acceptable transition period should at least be measured in half decades, not weeks.
    - chasil 10mo ago
      How is Apple not a forbidden product after this wall comes down? Perhaps you can limit the allowed manufactured units to India, but the U.S. also wants those.
    - kragen 10mo ago
      No, we've been trying it here in Argentina for the last 75 years. When we started, we were one of the richest countries in the world. The end state is worse than you can possibly imagine. It's not the way to rescue the country.
    - twodave 10mo ago
mertbio 10mo ago
Germany doesn’t compete in cheap manufacturing, they compete in highly precise manufacturing. There are bunch of things that are only manufactured in Germany. You don’t hear those companies that much because they are not public but they are well known by the people who work in specific industries. When you combine them, they are way bigger than the German companies you hear everyday which are laying off people or closing factories. For some reason, every time Europe is mentioned, there is always a comment about how Europe is struggling but when you look at the quality of life, happiness or life expectancy, all those numbers are higher than the US. People should stop obsessing with GDP.
- constantcrying 10mo ago
  I know many of these companies and I have even been invited to some of them. I am not some American desperate to insult Europeans. I am a German, I work in the German industry, my livelihood depends on this economy. >When you combine them, they are way bigger than the German companies you hear everyday which are laying off people or closing factories. This plainly is not true. Even the "small champions" are struggling, because they are mostly suppliers to the large companies. A very significant part of the "Mittelstand" exists as specialized suppliers to the German car, Aerospace and Railway companies. If those are struggling, then the suppliers feel the pain just as much.
  - locallost 10mo ago
    I am not German, but I live in Germany and things can be debated in detail and from various viewpoints. Things are rarely black and white. But I am getting kind of tired of the canned half informed opinions like "outrageous energy prices" usually although not always followed by "closing cheap nuclear will do that for you". Energy like natural gas is still elevated compared to 2021 but it's nowhere near outrageous anymore. Electricity as an end consumer I can now get cheaper than in e.g. France, and they just announced dirt cheap industry prices etc. So things can be complex, what was the case in 2023 might not be in 2025. Things change but it takes too much effort to question if what was true two years ago is still really true, so we are stuck with these lazy views.
jsheard 10mo ago
As the article goes into, Cherry had their lunch eaten because they barely made any attempt to innovate for decades. They coasted on their patents until they expired and then they were eaten alive, not just by cheaper alternatives, but by superior quality alternatives too. They were doomed regardless of where they were based.
- constantcrying 10mo ago
  >They were doomed regardless of where they were based. This was not inevitable. You even mentioned the reason it happened. Cherry isn't a one of here. This exact same story, successful product -> limited innovation -> bad clones from China -> superior "clones" from Chinese with actual innovations, keeps repeating itself in Germany. Germany is objectively not a good environment for manufacturing. Especially when it comes to manufacturing anything cost sensitive, but these companies obviously have themselves to blame. The PC Hardware market has drastically evolved and if Cheery had actually wanted to, they could have been at the forefront of that. But they haven't.
theandrewbailey 10mo ago
Deindustrialization isn't fun. Don't worry, some of us have been down that road. Sincerely, the American Rust Belt
- librasteve 10mo ago
  Birmingham moved to China
jnurmine 10mo ago
Cost is not everything. Quality matters a lot. If things are of higher quality, higher cost is acceptable to many. As a trivial example, talking about a ca. 5 EUR purchase here, I bought a German-made pencil sharpener (Möbius-Ruppert nr. 0603 "Vertex"). It's basically a small metallic block (brass) with two holes with blades attached. It is surprisingly heavy and while it may sound strange, the sharpening result is simply excellent. (I bought some Japanese-made pencils to pair with it) Chinese sharpeners can be had for under 0.5 EUR at best, they can be very cheap. However, I had Chinese sharpeners and they actually were the reason I ended up buying a German one. Unless I lose the German sharpener, I will never need to buy another.
- mzhaase 10mo ago
  Yeah well there are now plenty of Chinese designed products with quality as good or better than what you get in Europe: roborock, dji, bambu labs. The old Chinese = bad quality is no longer true.
- hasperdi 10mo ago
  One thing that the Chinese are really good at is cost innovation, reducing costs as many ways possible to make their products affordable for the majority. Their aim for good enough quality. I bet the sales ratio of the Chinese vs the German sharpeners exceed 20:1
- constantcrying 10mo ago
  The Chinese are absolutely capable of making some of the highest quality products in the world. Pretending that it is some unique feat of German engineering to make a good pencil sharpener is ridiculous. You are right that quality matters, which is why the Chinese producing cars of the same quality for 70% of the costs is such an existential threat to the German car industry. Associating China with cheap products is a false way to look at things. They absolutely are capable of excellent engineering and manufacturing. >I will never need to buy another. What a bizarre statement. The only hard part of the sharpener is the blade. This blade needs to be made of the proper material and sharpened the right way, you will absolutely need to buy new blades at some point in time. You can buy them here: https://www.moebius-ruppert.com/produkt/standard-ersatzmesser/ https://www.moebius-ruppert.com/produkt/standard-ersatzmesse... they are user replaceable. If you put them into a Chinese made one you get the exact same quality of sharpening. Lastly, these are pencil sharpeners. Being the best in the world at pencil sharpeners is irrelevant. Germany needs its car industry and they need to catch up to the quality of the Chinese if they want to keep it.

dinkblam 10mo ago

> Manufacturing in Germany is dying no surprise given the high taxes, extreme energy prices, massive bureaucracy, ridiculous regulations, work-hating employees and extremely business-hostile culture

cdmckay 10mo ago
I think it’s mostly the loss of Nord Stream
- AlexandrB 10mo ago
  It's the loss of Germany's last nuclear plants in 2023[1]. For a country supposedly aiming for net zero the shutdown of their nuclear infrastructure was a huge "own goal". Really sad to see. [1] https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-out-climate-intl https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/15/europe/germany-nuclear-phase-...
  - cenamus 10mo ago
    Strange that the share pf renewables has beem steadily increasing
- Phil_Latio 10mo ago
  It's just one piece of the puzzle. The cost for Co2 certificates is a more major reason. Starting 2027, hedge funds can buy these certificates which will be the nail in the coffin. It's basically Bitcoin on steroids with the difference that people buy Bitcoin out of free will, while the industry is forced to buy these certificates which get more scarce over time.
  - aurelwu 10mo ago
    Anyone can already buy those certificates - but as its an artificial market where rules can be changed politically it's actually way more resistant to such things than regular markets, so if those hedge funds feel like they want to lose some billions they can certainly do that. There is a large enough stockpile of certificates + leeway when to submit them that any short term market squeeze will just be dealt with politically.
    - Phil_Latio 10mo ago
      This argument, namely that politics can lower the price (by emitting extra certificates) when it gets too high, contradicts the whole reason for the mechanism in the first place: They claim a free market can find the right price better than politicians. But then they interfer anyway? The price will rise much larger than a dumb, fixed increase-schedule would. Because the "market" wants it's profit.
- mx7zysuj4xew 10mo ago
  This is it. A lot of people seem to be pushing some weird "anti-environmental" when the simple reality is that all energy costs I cannot understate the impact of Russian Energy being cut off. Right now we're paying roughly twice as much than we used to for compressed natural gas brought via tanker ships from the us. I genuinely believe that the war in Ukraine is mostly about energy dependence on Russia and Ukraine losing its transfer fees through their old pipelines
  - nwellnhof 10mo ago
    > I cannot understate the impact of Russian Energy being cut off. It's an interesting fact that Western Germany imported Russian gas since the early 1960s, throughout the cold war and in complete opposition to US interests. German Wikipedia has a nice overview: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geschichte_der_deutschen_Gasversorgung#Russisches_Erdgas https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geschichte_der_deutschen_Gasve...

pfannkuchen 10mo ago

Just stop trading manufactured products with Asia. Their people are still transitioning from agrarian hardship to urban factory life, and there seems to be a zeal that comes with this transition, a willingness to work hard for what here today would be considered little. Good for them. But in Europe we had this transition already and we became disillusioned with the lifestyle tradeoffs. Having our people do nothing productive while all of our life objects are made by others is not sustainable and it is awful for the morale of our peoples. It needs to be stopped.

dinkblam 10mo ago
> It needs to be stopped. forcing germans to buy everything at 10 times of what it costs now is not the way to rescue the country
- pfannkuchen 10mo ago
  Can you please think through what would happen a bit further? What you say here is a first order analysis on a very short time scale. It does not capture the end state of such a change. The acceptable transition period for a change depends on the severity of the problem the change is targeting, and in this case here the problem is quite severe, so our acceptable transition period should at least be measured in half decades, not weeks.
  - chasil 10mo ago
    How is Apple not a forbidden product after this wall comes down? Perhaps you can limit the allowed manufactured units to India, but the U.S. also wants those.
  - kragen 10mo ago
    No, we've been trying it here in Argentina for the last 75 years. When we started, we were one of the richest countries in the world. The end state is worse than you can possibly imagine. It's not the way to rescue the country.
  - twodave 10mo ago

mertbio 10mo ago

Germany doesn’t compete in cheap manufacturing, they compete in highly precise manufacturing. There are bunch of things that are only manufactured in Germany. You don’t hear those companies that much because they are not public but they are well known by the people who work in specific industries. When you combine them, they are way bigger than the German companies you hear everyday which are laying off people or closing factories. For some reason, every time Europe is mentioned, there is always a comment about how Europe is struggling but when you look at the quality of life, happiness or life expectancy, all those numbers are higher than the US. People should stop obsessing with GDP.

constantcrying 10mo ago
I know many of these companies and I have even been invited to some of them. I am not some American desperate to insult Europeans. I am a German, I work in the German industry, my livelihood depends on this economy. >When you combine them, they are way bigger than the German companies you hear everyday which are laying off people or closing factories. This plainly is not true. Even the "small champions" are struggling, because they are mostly suppliers to the large companies. A very significant part of the "Mittelstand" exists as specialized suppliers to the German car, Aerospace and Railway companies. If those are struggling, then the suppliers feel the pain just as much.
- locallost 10mo ago
  I am not German, but I live in Germany and things can be debated in detail and from various viewpoints. Things are rarely black and white. But I am getting kind of tired of the canned half informed opinions like "outrageous energy prices" usually although not always followed by "closing cheap nuclear will do that for you". Energy like natural gas is still elevated compared to 2021 but it's nowhere near outrageous anymore. Electricity as an end consumer I can now get cheaper than in e.g. France, and they just announced dirt cheap industry prices etc. So things can be complex, what was the case in 2023 might not be in 2025. Things change but it takes too much effort to question if what was true two years ago is still really true, so we are stuck with these lazy views.

jsheard 10mo ago

As the article goes into, Cherry had their lunch eaten because they barely made any attempt to innovate for decades. They coasted on their patents until they expired and then they were eaten alive, not just by cheaper alternatives, but by superior quality alternatives too. They were doomed regardless of where they were based.

constantcrying 10mo ago
>They were doomed regardless of where they were based. This was not inevitable. You even mentioned the reason it happened. Cherry isn't a one of here. This exact same story, successful product -> limited innovation -> bad clones from China -> superior "clones" from Chinese with actual innovations, keeps repeating itself in Germany. Germany is objectively not a good environment for manufacturing. Especially when it comes to manufacturing anything cost sensitive, but these companies obviously have themselves to blame. The PC Hardware market has drastically evolved and if Cheery had actually wanted to, they could have been at the forefront of that. But they haven't.

theandrewbailey 10mo ago

Deindustrialization isn't fun. Don't worry, some of us have been down that road. Sincerely, the American Rust Belt

librasteve 10mo ago
Birmingham moved to China

jnurmine 10mo ago

Cost is not everything. Quality matters a lot. If things are of higher quality, higher cost is acceptable to many. As a trivial example, talking about a ca. 5 EUR purchase here, I bought a German-made pencil sharpener (Möbius-Ruppert nr. 0603 "Vertex"). It's basically a small metallic block (brass) with two holes with blades attached. It is surprisingly heavy and while it may sound strange, the sharpening result is simply excellent. (I bought some Japanese-made pencils to pair with it) Chinese sharpeners can be had for under 0.5 EUR at best, they can be very cheap. However, I had Chinese sharpeners and they actually were the reason I ended up buying a German one. Unless I lose the German sharpener, I will never need to buy another.

mzhaase 10mo ago
Yeah well there are now plenty of Chinese designed products with quality as good or better than what you get in Europe: roborock, dji, bambu labs. The old Chinese = bad quality is no longer true.
hasperdi 10mo ago
One thing that the Chinese are really good at is cost innovation, reducing costs as many ways possible to make their products affordable for the majority. Their aim for good enough quality. I bet the sales ratio of the Chinese vs the German sharpeners exceed 20:1
constantcrying 10mo ago
The Chinese are absolutely capable of making some of the highest quality products in the world. Pretending that it is some unique feat of German engineering to make a good pencil sharpener is ridiculous. You are right that quality matters, which is why the Chinese producing cars of the same quality for 70% of the costs is such an existential threat to the German car industry. Associating China with cheap products is a false way to look at things. They absolutely are capable of excellent engineering and manufacturing. >I will never need to buy another. What a bizarre statement. The only hard part of the sharpener is the blade. This blade needs to be made of the proper material and sharpened the right way, you will absolutely need to buy new blades at some point in time. You can buy them here: https://www.moebius-ruppert.com/produkt/standard-ersatzmesser/ https://www.moebius-ruppert.com/produkt/standard-ersatzmesse... they are user replaceable. If you put them into a Chinese made one you get the exact same quality of sharpening. Lastly, these are pencil sharpeners. Being the best in the world at pencil sharpeners is irrelevant. Germany needs its car industry and they need to catch up to the quality of the Chinese if they want to keep it.