Posted on 02/06/2007 9:46:55 AM PST by george76
Benedikt Thoma recalls the moment he began to think seriously about leaving Germany. It was in 2004, at a New Year’s Day reception in nearby Frankfurt, and the guest speaker, a prominent politician, was lamenting the fact that every year thousands of educated Germans turn their backs on their homeland.
“That struck me like a bolt of lightning,” said Mr. Thoma, 44, an engineer then running his family’s elevator company. “I asked myself, ‘Why should I stay here when the future is brighter someplace else?’ ”
In December, as his work with the company became an intolerable grind because of labor disputes, Mr. Thoma quit and made plans to move to Canada. In its wide-open spaces he hopes to find the future that he says is dwindling at home...
There has been a steady exodus over the years, but it has recently become Topic A in a land already saddled with one of the most rapidly aging and shrinking populations of any Western nation.
With evidence that more professionals are leaving now than in past years, politicians and business executives warn about the loss of their country’s best and brightest.
Among the more popular programs on German television is “Goodbye Deutschland!: The Emigrants,” a 12-part series chronicling several families who have forsaken Germany for South Africa or southern Spain.
The trigger for this latest bout of angst was the release last fall of new government statistics showing that 144,800 Germans emigrated in 2005, up from 109,500 in 2001. At the same time, only 128,100 Germans returned, a decline of nearly 50,000 from the year before. That made it the first year in nearly four decades that more people left than came home.
Germany is not the only European country losing people...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
</Sarcasm>
Unemployment is high – as is underemployment...
Many of the Germans who "return home" are retired people who worked abroad and are returning to Germany to enjoy the sweet state pension benefits.
Avoiding Germany’s high taxes while working and then returning home for the nice benefits ?
That's the kind of immigrant we need. Not someone here for the welfare benefits, but someone here for a fresh start in a new world. Someone with ideas and ambitions to accomplish something.
That's the engine that powered America for hundreds of years. Shake off the old restraints and useless customs and go somewhere where you are free to do something.
Germany will soon be left with no one but layabouts and Gastarbeitern.
That's the kind of immigrant we need. Not someone here for the welfare benefits, but someone here for a fresh start in a new world. Someone with ideas and ambitions to accomplish something.
We currently have a German boy living with us for this school year. He absolutely loves the USA (and us) to the point that he constantly tells me that he is not going home. He is already planning on coming back for college and numerous other visits. I think that I am going to end up with a permanent German son.
His parents back in Germany are in agreement with him, so the whole family may end up over here.
I wonder how long before they build The Wall again - only this time around the whole country - so people will stay in their little 'worker's paradise'?
I've lived in Germany for 14 years...working for the US Air Force. The exit of Germans is a daily event. For 2005...there were 145,000 that left....spread via Canada, the US, England, Norway, the US, etc. They haven't issued 2006 results yet but it going to be the same amount plus. Over a 12-month period ending last year...there were 5,000 German doctors were relocated (they may or may not have kept citizenship...that was hidden)...but they worked outside of the country. If every year for 10 years this went on...with increases...then you could count 2 million easily gone....out of 80 million. Its not huge...but it starts to mount up if they are higher educated.
Adding to this...is a Thursday night show on the commerical network here...featuring new families each week who packed and left. 30 percent of their shows deal with Canada and everyone is extremely happy over the cost of living there. Most of the ones moving to the US on the show...go to Florida or Texas. So far...none of the families have moved back to Germany.
You will also notice that all of them did only minimual planning. They all had huge expectations upon arrival of finding employment...which surprisingly enough...they do find decent wages and enjoyble work. Then you have that cost of living issue and taxes...they are all shocked how cheap it can be to live outside of Germany.
Many German brains have been drained for some time now beginning with former PM and Saddam suck-up Herr Schroder. Shameful performance.
"While the European Union’s expansion has given Germans more options, their two favorite destinations are outside it: Switzerland and the United States."
That's great!!! Legal, motivated, tax paying new citizens!
Following the information towards the logical conclusion - Intelligent, highly motivated people leave socialistic societies for locations more likely to allow them to reap benefits from their efforts.
Canada is welcoming productive immigrants. We are not. My boss of 10 years, a high tech manager with a degree from Cambridge University in England just now got his green card so he can work for a company besides this one. Not citizenship mind you, just a green card. After 10 years.
Our immigration laws are pathetic. We ignore illegals, while keeping the valuable law abiding people out.
"...business-stifling regulation, but don't like the predictable results? "
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1779459/posts?page=92#92
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