They are EU's biggest economy, so it is important that they develop. But somehow it seems like they are dead set on tanking their own economy.
I think I understand the rationale: Conservative action a.k.a. doing nothing, feels safer than doing something. And not spending money feels safer too, even though it in the long run mean you lose money.
But why is there consistently a political majority for that? Old people afraid of change as everywhere else, surely, and I get that they are still traumatised by WWI.
But why the yonger people too? And what about young people? Is the generational trauma so big that they don't dare to make bold changes at all anymore?
Is it going to change? What will it take to change that attitude?
22 comments
It would need a complete change of mentality. This is similar to someone who asked on a Hungarian site: “What would Hungary be like without the constant pessimism and nostalgia?” And they got the reply: “It wouldn’t be Hungary then.”
Those pesky 128-year-olds Germans traumatized by the World War 1 invasion of Sentient Computers through the BUWUlge of the Sowomme and Meuwuse…
5 more years of recession? We’re about to elect a conservative chancellor ffs, and the prior liberal government, that “unanimously” agreed to digitisation and streamlining of bureaucracy, didn’t do shit.
I heard that for example in germany they don’t use much smart electricity meters because they fear that somehow someone can guess from the metering data what you are doing at home and this would violate privacy or whatever.
An example of their paranoia for technology.
Lose more living standard – what makes countries innovate and change is being poor. That’s why the central and eastern europe is generally rising while the wealthy western europe is mostly stagnating. No reason to innovate and change when doing nothing gets everyone a comfortable life.
Just my opinion: the UX quality of almost any software developed by Germans is BAD. It is so frustrating to use. And people might think that all software is like that and prefer more reliable tools
Well… They will start to get on with the times when Chinese products would have completely invaded the country and they will just be forced by circumstance to adapt to newer technologies.
Their train stations look like they haven’t had maintenance since decades. Digitisation 20 years behind neighbours like the Netherlands. Germany is rotting away. No sense of societal innovation or how to improve things.
it won’t. If you think digitization is bad, they are awfully scared of AI and see it as a trend, it won’t work.
I am not joking heard it from head of factory, multiple Professors and so on.
It is really bad in Germany, especially the banks, it is common to go bank and do everything by the bank teller, not even use the machines. But people living there are happy with the system, they are happy to get letters for everything, happy to wait 3 months to get your internet connected.
Because the system works, it is reliable but it is extremely extremely slow. And if you don’t like it, like me for example. Then you are the problem, the bad guy, and you are bringing down the mood -> You should leave 🙂 if you don’t like. That is what people told me.
This is part of German culture and tradition, the same issue has been around for centuries. It won’t change, ever. Here are the reasons:
– [https://youtu.be/oRBBoZdUyxY?si=VngZtctrn-QN4giF](https://youtu.be/oRBBoZdUyxY?si=VngZtctrn-QN4giF)
– [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPri_ezfQaY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPri_ezfQaY)
What it will take is a road towards safe and private digital services. The way tech companies around the world have developed doesnot give them much confidence.
What you see as conservatism might be a very realistic look at the risks. Seeing as tech entrepeneurs are giving nazi salutes, promoting neonazi parties in the German elections and trying to carve up their allies between themselves and Putin it seems a much more sensible stance than American voters have taken.
The German economy is hardly tanking, the chips that power your tech are mde with machines filled with German components and high tech parts. Part of why the US is 5-10 years off having their own chip industry is this high tech ecosystem of conpanies. It takes more than building a factory and lab to build chip machines. Also the reason China is 10+ years behind.
But Europe is playing catch up in innovation with China and America. They’re a few steps behind, the inflation reduction act was the most recent blow, drawing innovative new conpanies to the US.
Maybe the Trump shock to science and academia will do what Brexit did, but at a larger scale: a brain drain to the EU.
Public scrutiny on the world stage until business gets seriously affected. That’s the only way to push the businesses to make real pressure on politics. Won’t happen before the stories like VW closing plants in Germany is regular news. On a country wide scale.
Self perception needs to change as well. Germans keep thinking their way is the only right way. That wasn’t the case 20 years ago already, but cheap energy imports kept building up that ego. Now comes reality, and Schadenfreude.
Politics is a merry go round it Germany, nobody gets off the just change places and it goes round and round. Until they respect the views of all the people nothing will change ADF is a reaction to the merry go round. Once people are lose their voice they retreat to the extremes. Immigration, energy, cost of living, employment, social and economic trends always cause issues
EU has many potential even in tech companies. There re dozens European alternative for everything. Only problem is lack of public funding. Noone is investing in stocks so there are basically zero ways for these companies to push against US oligarchs, that can easily buy them in the end, even if they become small threat.
EU banning all American social media, that are not moderated and that spread scam, spam and Russian propaganda in way they try to destabilize Europe and dissolve it from inside should be first step to kick off these EU companies in combination with some funds injection. There are no other way you can replace American social networks, because they are simply giants and people will not move elsewhere when everyone is on these networks.
These ban would help avoiding end of EU and Kickstart its IT tech.
There are no some miracle technologies that US companies use to run these social networks. Instead anyone would be able to replicate any of them. Only problem is getting popular among public. Without massive funding and marketing push, it would not be possible even for US companies, but they did have these funds.
” Sach ma,wat sachste ? Mit Karte zahlen ? Seh ick aus wie nen schwulerr spanier sach ma haste nicht alle tassen im schrank oder wat, gleich langts aber richtig ! Der janze neumodische Unsinn mit ihren Commputermaschinen, dat is alles die Stasi mein Jung die STASIIII, hier is nichts mit digitalisierung diese dumme Wessi Scheiße und kämmd dir die haare verdammt, Ken Weltkrieg mitjemacht aber computersachen machen wollen globste doch selbst nicht du piefke”
Thats how it would turn out talking to my (german) grandpa about digitalzation in germany. People forget (or dont know) that we are on average quite old. Since they are stuck in their ways innovation of any sort turns into a uphill battle which will have and already has long lasting negative effects.
part of it IMO is the lack of a secure online identity. Just try getting a package from a DHL box… no, you don’t get a code, you need to authenticate the phone first (!) with a letter (!!) before you can pick up. And woe-betide you, you don’t remember your Post-ID – i have a package currently missing for well over 4 weeks and no-one knows where it is. DHL accepted it without the post ID, mind… hasn’t been returned to sender, but cannot possibly be delivered. Yay!
Sicherheit ist doch wichtig.
Strides have been made; card payments are far more accepted than they were even 5 years ago. But the skepticism remains.
Don’t write them off so easily.
In the nineties Germany was lagging behind too. They were called “the sick man of Europe”. But then the economy suddenly took off again and they were an example for the rest of Europe.
Can be more specific on how Germany is not with the times? Maybe were a bit further in NRW but you can pay via girocard or smartphone wallet pretty much everywhere, almost every supermarket has a self check out nowadays, my city works a lot with QR codes (requesting the Briefwahl literally took 10 seconds thanks to the QR code), the state of NRW by now has a high coverage of fiber internet and you may not believe it but Germany has done the transition to 5g really well and much faster than most other nations on this planet. Every possible insurance or bank now works entirely on apps rather than paper, tho paper is still possible i believe. You can create bank accounts entirely online. Theres lots of stuff i can put in my wallet such as plane tickets, cinema tickets, obviously pay with it and so on. The german train app db navigator is easily the best train app ive ever used.
If somebody is lacking behind, often its the Behörden but thats a cultural issue because those jobs have a certain reputation. The pay less than private companies but they have a reputation for being very relaxed workplaces with low demands. So they often arent keen on getting on with the times as theres no pressure. Theyre not a private company, they dont compete in the market therefore they have little incentives to modernize their workflows, although that does depend on the city and state. Again, mine works a lot with QR codes which makes many things easy and some stuff they used to do can now be done online. 3 years ago when I changed jobs I had to hand over my Führungszeugnis and I was able to request it entirely online, just had to use the NFC chip on my ID.
So if im a bit ignorant, enlighten me where Germany is behind, im not denying it, i just want specifica. And dont come with ‘oh lots of place only accept cash’, well thats just not true anymore, is it? Statistically the amount of people paying digitally is rising significantly each year, any business still only accepting cash will be out of business sooner than later, i know plenty people who dont even carry around cash anymore.
Idk what you are all on about honestly. I am from California and moved to Germany for university and at least in big cities it is all “digitized” enough. We good, main thing that is keeping the economy from its full potential is just the fact that everyone gets like 8 weeks vacation and nobody works overtime
You can’t fix an overgrown forest by pruning branch by branch. Sometimes fire is the only way to clear ground and space for whatever regrows to flourish
you can’t do bold changes, everything is super regulated and changes are almost impossible. So is innovation.
Thats actually easier than you think. But results would be terrible.
You just need to declare open hunting season on any and all the Engineers.
Cant have them running everything.
Germany is just a little bit bigger than Denmark. As much as we like to live in fairytale land, the reality is that it takes time to physically build the infrastructure, and the bigger the land is, the more time it takes.
You ought to know that Germans are extremely privacy oriented, and having all your stuff linked to one ID is terrifying to them. The risks of surveillance and tracking are not anything the Germans want to take. I know several Germans and none of them are interested in anything like MitID. I know, I know they say it’s safe and secure, but we have also read the stories of people who got social engineered into giving up their codes and letting scammers have access to their whole lives.
I personally have not activated either a MitID eller a NemID, because I think it just makes it easier for *them,* not for us, and it is not for me.