Posted on 05/25/2009 12:11:12 PM PDT by AlaskaErik
To many on the outside, Germany looks like a big, rich country enjoying the benefits of being Europe's largest economy. Inside, Germans know that looks can be deceiving. As in any nation, parts of Germany suffer from poverty, and Germans have always assumed they knew which parts: the west is rich and the east is poor. But a new report reveals the truth isn't that simple. The wealth imbalance in Germany isn't just between east and west; there are also large regional differences between the country's north and south. And across the country there are pockets of poverty more crushing than most Germans realized - and it's only getting worse.
Based on data taken before the recession hit, the new "poverty atlas" published by ParitÄtische Gesamtverband, an umbrella group for German charitable associations, and the Federal Statistics Office on May 18 is, according to the its authors, the first report to detail Germany's poverty levels and break the results down by region. It shows that in eastern Germany, for example, the average poverty rate is around 20%, with up to 27% of people in one area, Vorpommern, living below the poverty line. By contrast, in southern Germany, in the states of Hesse, Baden-WÜrttemberg and Bavaria, the poverty rate is around 11%.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
If a Eurosocialist can understand the rationale for letting the market decide the prevailing wage rate why can't our politicians? Even Republicans vote for minimum wage increases, which are so counterproductive.
If a Eurosocialist can understand the rationale for letting the market decide the prevailing wage rate why can't our politicians? Even Republicans vote for minimum wage increases, which are so counterproductive.
How much of that poverty is among the Turkish and other Muslim immigrant population?
They have free health care, which nobody has to pay for.
“If a Eurosocialist can understand the rationale for letting the market decide the prevailing wage rate why can’t our politicians?”
They can - they don’t care until we MAKE them care...
I'm sure they would have a higher rate than ethnic Germans, but there is still an imbalance between the former west and east. It's amazing how ruinous 45 years of communism were. And 20 years later the effects are still glaringly obvious. My guess is that it will take more than 45 years to reverse the effects of those 45 years under communism.
Yes, the “Wall of the Mind” will be there for generations.
Since this article is from Time, I suspect it has something to do with Merkel’s refusal to kiss Obama’s ass.
I’ve been in Germany for 15 years...working for the Air Force. The surprising point for me is that a guy could be 25 years old and making $3000 a month....and at age 40...he’ll barely have moved up to $3300 a month (over 15 years). The pay levels stay the same and a guy is lucky to get 1 percent pay raise per year.
Everyone learns to live within their means...no credit card empire...no fantastic house profits upon sales...and you are lucky if you buy a new car every seven years.
The curious thing about salaries is that they don’t equal in any fashion to the US scale. My local doctor here probably doesn’t clear more than $40k a year after taxes...and will never do better than that. Teachers make the same as a train engineer...$3600 a month.
But, as you can guess, the only solution Germans can see is to introduce even more socialism. This country is doomed.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,626346,00.html
Hmmm...nothing about religion mentioned?? Northern German is predominantly Protestant and Lutheran. Sadly they have caught the secular liberal disease like the fake Catholics at Notre Dame. Christianity in northern Germany is pretty dead anymore compared to the South.
Southern Germany and not just Bavaria is mainly Catholic and still fairly devout. I think Southern Germany and much of Austria are proably more devout Catholics then a large part of italy. I recall reading a British newspaper article where they smeared southern Germans as hayseeds and essentially Bible clingers. Bavarians have always been slurred at hayseeds and rednecks.
The other things about southern Germany from about Frankfurt south is most of the best car production takes place there. Audi (Ingolstadt), Porsche (Stuttgart), Mercedes (Stuttgart??), BMW (Munich) are all fairly far south. VW in Wolfsburg which is further north as is Ford in Colonge. Opel (GM) is in Russelsheim which is pretty far south.
Southern Germany is where it is at for food production including hops for beer, the best cars, weather and finance.
Note, however, in the depths of the full article, that anything below 60% of the median household income is “poverty” — in the US, that same measure would be around 30,000/ yr or more!
FWIW, the east of Germany has always been much less prosperous than the west. All the way back to the middle ages.
And I see Wolfsburg just won the Bundesliga, I wonder how much VW supports that team.
After so much, for so long, in so many ways, of political intervention in the economy, no one knows the true price of labor.
Lenin was once asked if he would communize the whole economy and he said no, he would keep 15% free so that they would know the prices/cost of things.
“in the US, that same measure would be around 30,000/ yr or more!”
Good point. At that level of income, you’d be classified as poor only if you had a family of 7 or more.
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/histpov/hstpov1.html
Sounds much like the differences between me and my German mother. The only difference is that I was always a conservative, even in my teens. But my mother was always a rabid leftist. Good thing she never became a citizen with the right to vote in our elections.
What you pointed out about the lack of wage increases over time is probably why Germans continue to head stateside as immigrants, despite the availability of “free” health insurance (paid out of hefty taxes on income, gasoline, purchases, and every fee under the sun) and Germany’s status as a wealthy Western country.
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