I seriously doubt the claim that companies held onto workers during the economic downturn, Why are there companies complaining about staff shortages (eg: Deutsche Bahn, Airport staff etc) if they retained their staff?
This. Shortages are mostly in jobs that suck like gastronomy or hard labor like warehouse work or in jobs that are highly niche and skilled like Doctors or scientists.
Well paying jobs that are easy to do have no shortages, in fact, you never see them advertised as they are usually quickly filled via internal hires or direct referrals.
Because more people are retiring than are finishing school. The baby boomers are the largest post-war generation in Germany, and that's coming back to bite us.
Most importantly, companies aren't used to the employment market being a seller's market, so they're not willing to pay competitive rates for new hires.
As result, no one's willing to do 3 years badly paid training (Ausbildung) just to earn below-average wage in a dead-end job.
...lots of people do Ausbildung, and it's a great way to get a steady permanent career with an automatic payrise. A lot of people in other first world countries would kill for such stability.
That may have been true before the pandemic and the self inflicted economic suicide committed by a Germany that has been fully transmuted into a US vasall state.
Even the Syrian refugees who came here in 2015-2016 are already looking for new jobs elsewhere. Most of the people in my surroundings who aren't following mainstream media anymore have either moved to other countries or are planning to do so.
Germany is done. Looks like the US is finally getting their Morgentau.
"a lot" doesn't mean anything if not compared to something, there are 200.000 less youths doing ausbilundg compared to 10years ago and 500.000 less than when it was at its top ~1980. And it will decline if we keep pretending...
I fully agree, but with how low the birthrates have been, even if 100% of young people choose an Ausbildung, there's not enough Fachkräfte for every open job. And employers aren't willing to enter the bidding war required to get the people they need.
Exactly. Just listen to the heads of industrial trade unions during press conferences or member meetups. (Don't know the correct term for it.)
German industry without Russian gas is dead in the water.
And it doesn't matter if you're voting CDU/CSU, SPD, Greens, Linke - they're all incapable of changing anything. I'd be surprised if anything would change if AfD or BSW had anything to say. It's probably too late.
No one will dare to provoke the US by talking to Putin about buying gas through that still functional Nordstream pipeline.
The suicide it's started with the WWI, where we (Europeans, but not alone) have wasted enormous resources, ALSO human intelligence one, killed in the war, and well... We never recovered.
Some observe nazi Germans as a big recovery after WWI, but they ignore that their tech was NOT born in their system, but before it, they only have found ways to profit (for a short time) from that, similarly post-WWII recovery was typically seen as a miracle but actually is the fire in the pan having generated the present. Post-WWII Germany have chosen (at least they was forced someway to) not to develop significant social infra, like rails, roads etc, as opposed for instance to France. As a result they are nearly the sole in the EU and surrounding with still so much not electrified trains, they relay so much on coal, they have a terrible telecommunication national network and so on. Long story short even with a remarkable (past) industrial development they are terribly fragile and without Russian gas they are simply done.
They have still a bit of high tech, but most of the industry is stuck in the past, like most people mental models, so they tend to waste their valuables assets anyway.
IMVHO as an EU (Italian) citizen the sole option for the whole EU is a POLITICAL union with France as the leader who unites, seeking partnership with the EAEU, our tech, witch is still very valuable even if falling rapidly behind here and there to China, and our industrial management in exchange of development space and natural resources. We both need the others, we can't both overpower each others, so we much remain on a fair plan, no matter each party agenda. That's would generate a base stable enough and with natural resources enough to grow and re-gain a dominant global position WITHOUT the need of a global aggressive projection because internal resources will suffice for a century at least. Unfortunately that's against both USA/UK and China interests and we are way to far for such a union...
We from the west in the history have tempted many time conquering Russia, all tentative fails. Sometimes some have get a bit of territory but not more than that: they have natural resources and space, they can travel using land as a diplomatic tool and a war tool.
There is ZERO chances for Ukraine, from the start, and that was NOT the target anyway. The war was not started by Russians to expand but by the USA to "Overextending and Unbalancing Russia" [1] given all other historical tentative have failed. The target was not Russia but Central Asia for spaces and natural resources, it's the target for all big powers, Russia, China, USA, UK, EU.
So far Russia has not overextended and it's pretty united, so also this strategy is a failure. Yes, so far they have no apparent alternatives to Putin, they are industrially weak, but they compensate since Putin could be potentially active for years to come and nuclear deterrence will help.
Meanwhile impoverished UK subjects are on the brink of a civil war, in USA the situation is much better since they have on their own space and natural resources, but the wealthiness gap is so big that they are an inch from a civil war [2], EU is impoverishing as well and citizens here so far are convinced by the fascist PR but that's will not last longer, so again a civil war is near, for UK it's a matter of months, for USA maybe some years and for the EU a little bit more, but not really much more. China have a looming demographic implosion so for them the disaster is just a bit more far then the EU. India, Indonesia, Iran etc are almost climatically doomed so they ruling class have essentially the same time of the UK ones.
The point is simple, the modern capitalism, witch is hybrid son of nazism and communism together it's FAILED, probably beyond repair. Traditional repair are wars but winnable ones, so far powers playing are so weak, fragile and military powerful that's no chance for no one to win a war, just some battles. Unfortunately we also miss a big slice of middle class, now impoverished, so we miss the fuel to build a new society out of the failed one. Germans future is the Ukrainian one, just few years in the future, Italy will follow thanks just to more individual wealth and more territory potential, France might stand a bit more since they are less dense so they can at least nourish their people longer and they still have a large slice of industrial productions, Spain might stand thanks to climate and renewables but climate change and their urbanocentrism will kill them soon. I can go on.
The sole theoretical chance, technically possible, but almost a social utopia, is unite the EU politically under France dome, since they are the sole global and nuclear power left, and unite EU and EAEU to access natural resources and spaces they have, offering in exchange industrial capacity they miss since the fall of the Soviet.
