In what ways is Germany not fecking it up

Elbaston

How come Germany managed to turn itself and its economy around after that whole "war" hoopla and then all that whole Communist Berlin wall thing.

Now they're minted.

Meanwhile in Ireland, which has seen (relative) peace for many many decades now and has had zero USSR overlords/Stazi state police....fecked.


Can we copy them ?

Frito

I declare thumb war.

Topper Harley

It would involve a lot of hard work, not complaining and feeling guilty for past generations mistakes and not making excuses for them, most of which really isn't our style.

CruelCoin

1: They built up the massive manpower and resources to wag the first world war.
2: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.
3: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.
4: Build up massive manpower and resources to wage the second world war.
5: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.
6: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.
7: Build up same again to be top of the financial and manufacturing pile.

Meanwhile we here have this humongoid pack of flaming retards rocking back and forth hugging their knees moaning "why won't they stop telling us what to do".

They have the answers, they know how it works. They've been to hell and back several times and we tell them to get bent?

It astonishes me.

Elbaston

They're not really that different from us ...are they ?

Sure, they eat bratwurst and wear leiderhosen in bed and are punctual.
But they're essentially the same as us - how come they're loling it up at the rest of Europe.

General General

CruelCoin wrote: »

1: They built up the massive manpower and resources to wag the first world war.
2: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.
3: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.
4: Build up massive manpower and resources to wage the second world war.
5: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.
6: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.
7: Build up same again to be top of the financial and manufacturing pile.

Meanwhile we here have this humongoid pack of flaming retards rocking back and forth hugging their knees moaning "why won't they stop telling us what to do".

They have the answers, they know how it works. They've been to hell and back several times and we tell them to get bent?

It astonishes me.

Cruel, Coin, cruel.

Baked.noodle

If I was in charge I'd tax the bejasus out of fun.. Tobacco, booze, amphetamines, tea, the list is endless. It's not like anybody would behave any differently. Then when the money roles in I would invest the vice money into dodgy Irish banks and kick start another debt bubble that will make all other debt bubbles pale in significance. With all the money sloshing about in Ireland I would buy shares in banks in other EU countries, such as Germany. When it all goes to hell, they will bale us out.

stretchdoe

They get us/Irish taxpayers to bail out their banks/bondholders loans to private institutions having, with the compliance of much of our media and most of our politicians, established the narrative that it's completely 'our fault'.

It's easy enough when your victims are willing prey.

Elbaston

Yeah but they buy their own local stuff dont they.
They don't buy as much imported stuff.

DEFTLEFTHAND

They amaze me, they were cleaned out and fleeced from 2 separate World War reparations, the Americans especially did them over big time after WW2. They had to struggle through reunification at a later date but yet in 2013 they are the leading economy in Europe.

Maybe the next time we go to war they will finally be in place to fulfill their destiny. :pac:

stretchdoe

Elbaston wrote: »

Yeah but they buy their own local stuff dont they.
They don't buy as much imported stuff.

And everyone else bought their stuff..

They benifited hugely from the EU/ECB/interest rates etc.. and are currently trying to ensure, again with the help of quisling politicians from other nations, that this will continue.

Britain's reluctance to play along may well be a spanner in the works; perhaps a welcome one.

Having said all that, there's no doubt they have their sh*t together, in terms of fostering domestic industry/business.

Karl Stein

You need to look at the roots of the plant not the flower Danielson.

Jimoslimos

A strong manufacturing industry that makes stuff. People buy stuff. Germany gets rich.

Ireland on the other hand had wealth built on imaginary property prices. People don't buy dreams. Ireland bankrupt

DainBramage

Marshall plan post WW2 provided finance to rebuild. Many european countries also availed of this.

Post cold war Germans paid (and still pay I think) a 'reunification' tax to fund merger with East Germany.

holystungun9

Renting and not buying.

T-K-O

Jimoslimos wrote: »

A strong manufacturing industry that makes stuff. People buy stuff. Germany gets rich.

Ireland on the other hand had wealth built on imaginary property prices. People don't buy dreams. Ireland bankrupt

This. They have a lot of brands that sell across the globe.

On a side note, this is another Ireland is crap (random word) is great thread. Yawn.

How come this great nation of Germans were leading money like there was no tomorrow?
The Germans are not without fault in this current European mess

Elbaston

T-K-O wrote: »

This. They have a lot of brands that sell across the globe.

On a side note, this is another Ireland is crap (random word) is great thread. Yawn.

How come this great nation of Germans were leading money like there was no tomorrow?
The Germans are not without fault in this current European mess

Well, so what, I dared question something.

T-K-O

Elbaston wrote: »

Well, so what, I dared question something.

Questioning why Ireland has struggled in the past / present would have been far more interesting. Comparing us to Germany, less so.

Elbaston

T-K-O wrote: »

Questioning why Ireland has struggled in the past / present would have been far more interesting. Comparing us to Germany, less so.

If you don't like the thread go somewhere else.
Your input is greatly appreciated.

T-K-O

Elbaston wrote: »

If you don't like the thread go somewhere else.
Your input is greatly appreciated.

I don't like it but I'm staying.

corktina

the difference is that they go out to look for business and we sit here waiting for it to come to us...take ALDI and LIDL, purpose built chains to sell German products in....how many shops does Dunnes or SuperValu have abroad selling Irish produce?

RDM_83 again

Yes it has a functioning economy but I am not sure Germany should be considered a paradise, its got pretty low wages and in certain areas pretty damn high poverty levels.
Also it would be fine if we were in the UK to look at how Germany has handled things, but Ireland looking to Germany for a solution just doesn't make sense, you can't create that sort of heavy industry and manufacturing quickly and you really can't in a small country on the periphery of europe.

Elbaston

T-K-O wrote: »

I don't like it but I'm staying.

Good man. Every time you comment it keeps my question on the first page just that little bit longer.

anto9

They were always savers rather than spenders .Credit cards were never a big thing in Germany .Their Banks messed up like ours but the fundamentals were always sound .A huge rock around their neck has been taking over Eastern Germany .Wages in Germany have stayed much the same for the last 20 years .Only now are things starting to get good for them again .

Celly Smunt

It's quite easy when you think about it.The germans have always built steady from the foundation rather than creating bubbles on the back of past failures,like we're doing now.

If ireland was a house it would be constantly crumbling at the foundations with new houses being built on top of collapsed ones.


(Irish people seem to have a fascination with houses,hence my analogy)

Forest Demon

Germany is kind of like Africa except it is the opposite.

Celly Smunt

anto9 wrote: »

They were always savers rather than spenders .Credit cards were never a big thing in Germany .Their Banks messed up like ours but the fundamentals were always sound .A huge rock around their neck has been taking over Eastern Germany .Wages in Germany have stayed much the same for the last 20 years .Only now are things starting to get good for them again .

The only reason they've restricted the wages in a way is because Germany's worst fear is inflation,and rightly so.

T-K-O

Celly Smunt wrote: »

It's quite easy when you think about it.The germans have always built steady from the foundation rather than creating bubbles on the back of past failures,like we're doing now.

If ireland was a house it would be constantly crumbling at the foundations with new houses being built on top of collapsed ones.


(Irish people seem to have a fascination with houses,hence my analogy)

and the root cause of that is the answer to a lot of our woes. We are IMO immature as a nation.

bnt

anto9 wrote: »

They were always savers rather than spenders.

The Chinese are even greater savers ... but that's coming back to bite them, because of what Chinese banks have been doing with those savings. When you put money in to a bank, it doesn't just sit there: a good proportion of it is lent back out e.g. your savings are funding someone else's mortgage.

But in China, the banks have been lending the money back out to property speculators, with a State mandate to do so. (It's not quite that simple, of course, but close enough.) So, if there's ever a Crete-style bank run there - not at all difficult to imagine - a lot of Chinese people are going to find out just how unsafe their savings are. :eek:

So Banking policy is still central to why Germany is more stable. Another important point is that property ownership isn't generally as popular there as it is here. About 53% property ownership compared to 70% in the UK and 74% in Ireland (as of 2011)

But they do have a boom in some parts this year, most notably Berlin, and there are already warning signs. As in London, the boom in Berlin is at least partly fuelled by foreign investors. But the lack of a real property boom in Germany during the "boom years" is (in my opinion) a major reason why Germany didn't have an economic crash.

anto9

^ Berlin did have the cheapest property prices in Western Germany .Largely because of Berlins very high unemployment rate .( relative to the rest of Germany ) .I was thinking of buying a small investment Apartment there in 2008 ,but German property taxes ,low rents ,and strong tennant rights put me off the idea .

rossie1977

Jimoslimos wrote: »

A strong manufacturing industry that makes stuff. People buy stuff. Germany gets rich.

Ireland on the other hand had wealth built on imaginary property prices. People don't buy dreams. Ireland bankrupt

pretty much this, germany were the worlds leading export nation for years ahead of even the us while most of our exports are coming from companies just based in ireland

volkswagen, daimler ag, allianz, E.ON, siemens, bmw, deutsche bank, bayer, bosch all insanely huge companies on a global scale each of them many times bigger than our biggest homegrown company crh

dxhound2005

How come there are 3 million unemployed in Germany if it is so perfect?

My name is URL

Germany isn't as perfect as people like to think it is. There's a newly constructed airport in Berlin, unopened since it was completed last year and riddled with problems (construction, ownership etc). It's costing taxpayers millions of euro every month, while politicians squabble and bitch about it.

Officials can't even figure out how to turn the lights off. Thousands of light bulbs illuminate the gigantic main terminal and unused parking lots around the clock, a massive energy and cost drain that appears to be the result of a computer system that's so sophisticated it's almost impossible to operate.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2013/04/08/berlin-airport-fiasco-an-embarrassment-for-germans/2062533/

The_Valeyard

My name is URL wrote: »

Germany isn't as perfect as people like to think it is. There's a newly constructed airport in Berlin, unopened since it was completed last year and riddled with problems (construction, ownership etc). It's costing taxpayers millions of euro every month, while politicians squabble and bitch about it.




http://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2013/04/08/berlin-airport-fiasco-an-embarrassment-for-germans/2062533/

That would be Schoenefeld airport?

Looks lovely. But of course Aer Lingus has to pull up at that crummy terminal like everyone else.
Was expecting a much better airport for the Capital of Germany.

anto9

dxhound2005 wrote: »

How come there are 3 million unemployed in Germany if it is so perfect?

There will always be those who dont want to work ,or are not able to work ,through llness or mental health problems .Also many of those 3M will be in East Germany ,where there are still pockets of undevelopment and poverty .

Tom M

stretchdoe wrote: »

They get us/Irish taxpayers to bail out their banks/bondholders loans to private institutions having, with the compliance of much of our media and most of our politicians, established the narrative that it's completely 'our fault'.

It's easy enough when your victims are willing prey.

If you have a pension they probably bailed you out too.

T-K-O

Tom M wrote: »

If you have a pension they probably bailed you out too.

Chicken egg situation, if they weren't so reckless we wouldn't need bailing out :pac:

Wibbs

CruelCoin wrote: »

1: They built up the massive manpower and resources to wag the first world war.

Eh they were an industrial giant and imperial nation for a long time before the Great war ever kicked off. That was a clash of European empires and Germany was right up there.

2: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.

1) they didn't get "bombed into the ground". Civilian populations outside of battlefields were of a magnitude lower than what was to come. For a start the technology wasn't there yet for anything ike strategic bombing 2) they lost around 3%(IIRC) of their population. Not close to a majority of working age men.

3: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.

Yes the reparations had a helluva lot to do with that. The Weimar governments response to the inflation over cooked it in a big way though. They handled it badly. Still by the 20's when the US and elsewhere went into a major depression Germany was doing relatively well again. However things weren't all sweetness...

4: Build up massive manpower and resources to wage the second world war.

Oh the Austrian corporal and his cronies built up a strong Germany(with huge industrial help from the US BTW), but it was utterly unsustainable economically and well they knew it, hence they got all invadery. As for massive manpower and resources, they had the former, but were actually quite lacking in the latter. By wars start their army was more horse drawn than mechanised. Their air force while large was often struggling to keep up with demand and requirements. EG in the Battle of Britain, the UK had the same amount of fighters at the start and soon after were producing fighters at a rate twice that of Germany and they had more pilots too. Contrary to popular belief the British weren't nearly in as much danger of losing the battle of Britain as subsequent retellings would have it. Churchill being a clever bugger to his credit knew it too.

5: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.

THis is far more accurate compared to your point 2.

6: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.

Collapse and reparations yes, however the Marshall plan offset quite a bit of that and because it was in the interest of the post war allies to keep Germany sweet they didn't repeat the stupidity of the post great war Versailles treaty.

7: Build up same again to be top of the financial and manufacturing pile.

Your post is riddled with half truths that the Daily Mail mght buy into but reality and history was very different and far more complex. Yes the Germans are a resilient people but attempting to draw comparisons between Ireland and Germany is comparing apples to.. well the planet Neptune.

For a start Ireland was never an industrial nation. The industrial revolution largely passed us by. Save for small areas in the north of the country Ireland in the 18th and 19th centuries was an agrarian society and a largely subsistence one at that. The only empire we had was our huddled masses fcuking off overseas. When we finally gained independence we were economically fcuked, our biggest export by far was farming and our own sons and daughters. The economic minnows of Europe. Our population had also crashed from a height of near 8 million in the mid 19th century to 2 odd. For a nation with a tiny population with no direct experience of an industrial revolution, stuck on the very edge of Europe we've ended up not doing too badly at all. Even though we have had dribbling morons at the helm for more times in our history than not.

It astonishes me.

It astonishes me that so many people here can't see the differences and the nuances of history and geography and prefer to fall on the poor mouth self flagellation all too common here.

dxhound2005

anto9 wrote: »

There will always be those who dont want to work ,or are not able to work ,through llness or mental health problems .Also many of those 3M will be in East Germany ,where there are still pockets of undevelopment and poverty .

I don't think the 3 million would include people unable to work through illness. Surely unemployment statistics are for people seeking work? Germany is not much different than anywhere else when it comes to poverty.

http://www.goethe.de/ges/soz/soz/en2819817.htm

The picture of rich Germans living off our misery which they caused is far from the truth for much of their population.

Lone Stone

CruelCoin wrote: »

1: They built up the massive manpower and resources to wag the first world war.
2: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.
3: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.
4: Build up massive manpower and resources to wage the second world war.
5: Get bombed into the ground, lose majority of working age male population.
6: Economic collapse and crippling reparations.
7: Build up same again to be top of the financial and manufacturing pile.

Meanwhile we here have this humongoid pack of flaming retards rocking back and forth hugging their knees moaning "why won't they stop telling us what to do".

They have the answers, they know how it works. They've been to hell and back several times and we tell them to get bent?

It astonishes me.

Im fairly sure you missed the big part about Germany getting debt forgiveness after ww2.

Cody Pomeray

Ooh man I have been to Germany they are soooo efficient and organized and perfect like the clubs open till like 6am and they are like real clubs maan, none of this coppers shoite you get here rightsh, and man they really make the unemployed work fcuking hard for their money over there, like there are no lazy sh1ts and they all like shop in lidl man.

yeah i have been to berlin loads of times. festivals and stuff like. amazing beer mean. seriously i am going to move there some day soon. so much better than this dump. some day soon.

anto9

Cody Pomeray wrote: »

Ooh man I have been to Germany they are soooo efficient and organized and perfect like the clubs open till like 6am and they are like real clubs maan, none of this coppers shoite you get here rightsh, and man they really make the unemployed work fcuking hard for their money over there, like there are no lazy sh1ts and they all like shop in lidl man.

yeah i have been to berlin loads of times. festivals and stuff like. amazing beer mean. seriously i am going to move there some day soon. so much better than this dump. some day soon.

If you do go ,i hope you improve your English first ,never mind knowing German .
Out of interest what age are you ?

anto9

dxhound2005 wrote: »

I don't think the 3 million would include people unable to work through illness. Surely unemployment statistics are for people seeking work? Germany is not much different than anywhere else when it comes to poverty.

http://www.goethe.de/ges/soz/soz/en2819817.htm

The picture of rich Germans living off our misery which they caused is far from the truth for much of their population.

>>Surely unemployment statistics are for people seeking work? Germany is not much different than anywhere else when it comes to poverty.<<

Thats a minor point ,what i am saying is that most of the 3 m are in OOST Deutschland .

Drakares

I'm currently living in Germany, and here are a few pure and utter common sense ways of running things that would be so simple to implement.

1: All medical expenses are covered by the state, as are financed by a high health insurance tax on all employed people in the country (which is also very high in Ireland). A German person must visit the Dentist at least once per year for a checkup to keep your teeth in line. If you fail to show up to the dentist and show up 10 years later with your teeth hanging out, you MUST PAY FOR IT YOURSELF.

Plus, their health service is extremely well funded. The average time from calling an ambulance to it arriving is 7 minutes. I needed one before in the country and it arrived within 3 minutes.

2: Work experience and Education. A lot, if not most if German education programmes, be it a degree or a lesser education come accompanied with an 'Ausbildung' or 'Praktikum' in which a huge portion (a lot of the times, half of your time) spent working in the chosen field of study.

Companies here are massive into it, and seriously take on and train up young students soon to be entering the jobs market. For example near me, companies like ZF (Engineering) and European Aeronautics, Defense and Space Agency take on thousands of students every year to train them up on dozens of different professions from HR, to engineering, IT, Accounting and so on. A lot of the times these students end up being offered full time jobs, or at least finish their degrees knowing how real work works.

Ireland has no such program, I done 2 weeks IT work experience when I was studying in Dublin and I was sit down doing monkey work that no one else wanted to do, also was treated as an annoyance instead of someone who wanted to learn.

3: Recycling. The cost of a bottle of coke for example, has 15c added to it, and you get the 15c back when you bring the bottle back. Same goes with cans, glass and so on.

NO ONE here fúcks their tin cans into the normal bins, everything is recycled on a massive scale.

4: People do not borrow beyond what they can pay back. In fact borrowing money from the bank isn't all that common here. Almost everyone I know at home owes the bank some form of thousands from a carloan, mortgage, holiday or something.

5: Grants for education must be payed back to the government (at least 50% of what you've been given) once you've finished your education and are within full time employment. They are extremely lenient with this, and you can pay back €5 per week or .5% of your salary over a period of however long you wish. These grants come with no interest.

6: If you are intelligent and capable, you will get education here. Doesn't matter if you come from a poor family or whatever, there are government sponsored scholarships as well as silly amounts of ways of getting funded for education without the worry of paying it back with interest.

I could keep going but my fingers are getting tired!

Shenshen

dxhound2005 wrote: »

How come there are 3 million unemployed in Germany if it is so perfect?

Out of 80 million inhabintants? That's what, 4%?

Forest Demon

Drakares wrote: »

I'm currently living in Germany, and here are a few pure and utter common sense ways of running things that would be so simple to implement.

1: All medical expenses are covered by the state, as are financed by a high health insurance tax on all employed people in the country (which is also very high in Ireland). A German person must visit the Dentist at least once per year for a checkup to keep your teeth in line. If you fail to show up to the dentist and show up 10 years later with your teeth hanging out, you MUST PAY FOR IT YOURSELF.

Plus, their health service is extremely well funded. The average time from calling an ambulance to it arriving is 7 minutes. I needed one before in the country and it arrived within 3 minutes.

2: Work experience and Education. A lot, if not most if German education programmes, be it a degree or a lesser education come accompanied with an 'Ausbildung' or 'Praktikum' in which a huge portion (a lot of the times, half of your time) spent working in the chosen field of study.

Companies here are massive into it, and seriously take on and train up young students soon to be entering the jobs market. For example near me, companies like ZF (Engineering) and European Aeronautics, Defense and Space Agency take on thousands of students every year to train them up on dozens of different professions from HR, to engineering, IT, Accounting and so on. A lot of the times these students end up being offered full time jobs, or at least finish their degrees knowing how real work works.

Ireland has no such program, I done 2 weeks IT work experience when I was studying in Dublin and I was sit down doing monkey work that no one else wanted to do, also was treated as an annoyance instead of someone who wanted to learn.

3: Recycling. The cost of a bottle of coke for example, has 15c added to it, and you get the 15c back when you bring the bottle back. Same goes with cans, glass and so on.

NO ONE here fúcks their tin cans into the normal bins, everything is recycled on a massive scale.

4: People do not borrow beyond what they can pay back. In fact borrowing money from the bank isn't all that common here. Almost everyone I know at home owes the bank some form of thousands from a carloan, mortgage, holiday or something.

5: Grants for education must be payed back to the government (at least 50% of what you've been given) once you've finished your education and are within full time employment. They are extremely lenient with this, and you can pay back €5 per week or .5% of your salary over a period of however long you wish. These grants come with no interest.

6: If you are intelligent and capable, you will get education here. Doesn't matter if you come from a poor family or whatever, there are government sponsored scholarships as well as silly amounts of ways of getting funded for education without the worry of paying it back with interest.

I could keep going but my fingers are getting tired!

I welcome our new Germainian overlords!

Aidric

A simple drive through Germany will paint a clear picture. They predominantly drive German cars, which just serves as a tangible interface for the manufacturing powerhouse that is Germany. They build high quality desirable products both for export and the home market, in turn stimulating the economy.

That plus they have a strong work ethic and in general are a prudent people.

mikemac1

Secondary schools are streamed and while anyone can make it to university where you went to school will affect you for a long time.

The Brits had something similar with their grammar and comprehensive schools though not so much anymore

Recognizing that university is not for everyone it's good that some get to concentrate on vocational subjects but there can claims that some schools are for the gifted and some are for the slow.

Rambling post, I don't know if it's good or bad. Just that's it's different in Ireland. Would parents accept that their child can be labelled and streamed when they are young and that will affect them for a long time?

I know we have private schools but if you have money you can get into them, it doesn't tell you the ability of the student.

The left wingers in Germany hate this system for sure

Geuze

Shenshen wrote: »

Out of 80 million inhabintants? That's what, 4%?

An unemployment rate is never as a % of the pop, it is always as a % of the labour force.

4-5% unemployment is normal, there is always frictional unemployment.

If you lose a job on Friday, you usually don't start a new one the following Monday morning, so you will be frictionally unemployed while searching for a new job.

And so on.

Geuze

Drakares wrote: »

I'm currently living in Germany, and here are a few pure and utter common sense ways of running things that would be so simple to implement.

1: All medical expenses are covered by the state, as are financed by a high health insurance tax on all employed people in the country (which is also very high in Ireland). A German person must visit the Dentist at least once per year for a checkup to keep your teeth in line. If you fail to show up to the dentist and show up 10 years later with your teeth hanging out, you MUST PAY FOR IT YOURSELF.

Plus, their health service is extremely well funded. The average time from calling an ambulance to it arriving is 7 minutes. I needed one before in the country and it arrived within 3 minutes.

Note that the health ins premium is approx 15% of wages - you pay 7.5%, the employer pays 7.5%.

Pension = 20% of wages, again 10% ee, 10% er

Add in unemployment insurance and LT care insurance, and workers pay approx 20% social insurance.

[That's before income tax.]

Our PRSI rate is 4%, in contrast.

Geuze

Drakares wrote: »

I'm currently living in Germany, and here are a few pure and utter common sense ways of running things that would be so simple to implement.



2: Work experience and Education. A lot, if not most if German education programmes, be it a degree or a lesser education come accompanied with an 'Ausbildung' or 'Praktikum' in which a huge portion (a lot of the times, half of your time) spent working in the chosen field of study.

Companies here are massive into it, and seriously take on and train up young students soon to be entering the jobs market. For example near me, companies like ZF (Engineering) and European Aeronautics, Defense and Space Agency take on thousands of students every year to train them up on dozens of different professions from HR, to engineering, IT, Accounting and so on. A lot of the times these students end up being offered full time jobs, or at least finish their degrees knowing how real work works.

Ireland has no such program, I done 2 weeks IT work experience when I was studying in Dublin and I was sit down doing monkey work that no one else wanted to do, also was treated as an annoyance instead of someone who wanted to learn.

YES, their apprenticeship systems are well respected, and are part of the reason why youth unemployment is lower than elsewhere.