The Good Life in Europe

Five million Germans out of work

Germany's unemployment figure rose above the psychologically important level of five million last month. On Wednesday, the German Federal Labour Agency said the jobless total had reached 5.037 million in January, which takes the jobless rate to 12.1%.

"Yes, we have effectively more than five million people unemployed," a government minister said earlier on ZDF public television.

Unemployment has not been this high in Germany since the 1930s.

Changing calculations

Changes to the way the statistics are compiled partly explain the jump of 572,900 in the numbers.

But the figures are embarrassing for the government.

"With the figures apparently the worst we've seen in the post-war period, these numbers are very charged politically," said Christian Jasperneite, an economist with MM Warburg.

"They could well put an end to the recent renaissance we've seen by the SPD [the ruling Social Democrats] in the polls, and with state elections due in Schleswig-Holstein and North Rhine-Westphalia, they may have an adverse effect on the government's chances there."

Worse to come

The opposition also made political capital from the figures. It said there are a further 1.5 million-2 million people on subsidised employment schemes who are, in fact, looking for real jobs.

It added that government reforms, including unpopular benefit cuts, do not go far enough.

Under the government's controversial "Hartz IV" reforms, which came into effect at the beginning of the year, both those on unemployment benefits and welfare support and those who are long-term unemployed are officially classified as looking for work.

The bad winter weather also took its toll, as key sectors such as the construction sector laid off workers.

Adjusted for the seasonal factors, the German jobless total rose by 227,000 in January from December.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/business/4228739.stm

Correct. The number rose especially, since now the welfare recipients were included in the jobless statistic for the first time ever.

As if our unemployment statistics are correct. They're not.

Our unemployment is much, much worse than the statistics used by the admin show.

They use every trick to massage the numbers down, my favorite being reducing the numbers of people who are actually looking for work.

If we don't count people who've given up, the unemployment figures look great...

Cycloptichorn

Is it possible that a substantial portion of the 227,000 increase is in fact those on welfare who were not previously counted as unemployed?

I'm sure it's still bad, but it doesn't look like it's gotten worse in the last month when all factors are considered.

Here in the US, don't we only count those who are getting unemployment benefits as unemployed?

Now, here in Germany, you get - like in the USA - unemployment benefits only for one year. (Before, it was up to three years; until five years ago, 'lifelong'.)


Now, everyone, who 'says offically' that she/he is looking for work, gets the same money: those, who are unemployed after one year as well as those, who got before 'only' welfare.

Actually, I think, the system is now very similar to the US, with the only difference, that we count here them all as 'unemployed'.

Watch out McGentrix, bipo is wearing D'Artagnan's favor.

But of course not.

Never would we expect a true American, like yourself, to rub elbows with the riffraff that patronize WalMart.

Hey, guess what? Europe ain't America.

Jeremy Rifkin (a media slut if I've ever met one) and TR Reid ( a very common sense sort of guy) both have opined that Europe will supplant the US as the shining city on the hill.

Rifkin I dismiss out of hand. Reid .... I'll have to read his book.

In any case, Europe and the US are, clearly, not on parallel paths. And why should they be?

Given very long history of constant warfare, it really is inspiring to see the development of the European Union. In fact, the EU is as good an argument as anything else that we are not bound by historical norms.

However.... All is not honkey dory in Europe.

1) Immigration.

European birth rates are lower that those in the US. In fact, Euro birth rates can't sustain current demographic norms.

Guess who are moving to Europe?

No, not Christian Latinos, but Islamic Middle Easterners.

Europe may assert that it is less "religious" than the US, (and this is so). but. culturally, they are far more Christian than America..

We are on the verge of a crisis in Europe centered around the fact that it has, for year, been importing Islamic labor to do the jobs Europeans scorn.

The US may be experiencing a similar dilemma as respects Mexicans but the enormous difference is that Mexicans are Christians while the Turks in Germany, the Algerians in France, the Pakistanis in the UK and the Molloccans in the Netherlands are ALL Muslims.

Yes, we should all get along, but we don't. Islamic fascists in Hollland are assassinating Media figures who challenge their orthodoxy. Islamic radicals in the UK are (believe it or not) advancing an effort to transform England into a Muslim nation. France feels the need to outlaw veils Muslim school girls. Etc etc etc.

If Europe proves to be the most progressive and vital force on planet Earth, God bless them....If so, I will be among those who argue that the US should emulate them.

However....I don't, for a minute, believe that Europe represents the next wave. Islamic immigration alone is going to cripple Europe, but putting that aside, the Euro Welfare State has to be financed and there is a certain limit to the "science" of economics.

Europe is America's Motherland. I, for one, feel an incredible affinity for Europe., and yet it would be foolish to belive that Europe will always be as we perceive Europe to be.

If European Leftists want to cast the US as the Bad Guy, so be it, but they are fools if they think their best interests lie with anyone other than the West...and, lets face it, the West is led by America

This is Tony Blair's position and let's not dismiss his superior skills simply because he has aligned himself with a Republican administration.

What do you mean here by "Europe" exactly?

The geographical continent?

The EU?

Just some countries?

Any source for that?

Hmmm - lol - I see Germany is to be the new France for some on the right here...nemmind that Gunga's ridiculous thread premise was blown up by the appearance of the very first fact....

Will be worse, when we perhaps get a conservative government with the next elections - like the French did a couple of years ago (our president now is a conservative already, like Jacques Chirac ... :wink:

We need to breed more children for the next war.

Checking into the Telegraph story on labor board requirement
FORWARDED TO ME BY ANOTHER READER ON ANOTHER SITE:

Like everyone, I was appalled at the story involving the young German woman told to take a job as a prostitute or lose her benefits. I have lived in Germany for five and a half years now, and I know how upset people are about the recent attempts to change the unemployment system (generally considered to be a disaster by everyone and another major blunder by the ruling coalition that the opposition is too ham-fisted to take advantage of). But after some reflection, something about it just didn't ring quite true. For one thing, in my experience German bureaucrats tend to be friendly, polite, and helpful and the service tends to run quite smoothly (especially in the eyes of native Southern Californian who knows all about California DMV). So I did some checking.

This appears to be a popular topic in chat rooms and fora all over the Internet, but every single discussion in English stems from the same article in the Telegraph that your original correspondent cited. Among other problems I found in the article, is the fact that "Merchtild" is not a real name; the attorney's name is actually "Mechthild". More suspicious is the fact that I couldn't find any sources in the German news. This is the sort of thing that ought to have been reported, by the tabloid press, if nothing else. After checking a few places, I finally tracked the original source to an article in a paper called "die Tageszeitung" or TAZ.

It is important to know that the TAZ is a radical left-wing paper founded by people with ties to the old Red Army Faction. It is rather typical of its genre and its articles should be read with a large helping of salt. I suppose it is slightly to the left of the old "LA Free Press" (but I'm a little too young to have actually read that particular journal). In any case, the article was pointing out an apparent gap in the new employment laws that could produce a situation like this and cited the attorney mentioned in the Telegraph article (spelling her name correctly). They also quoted a bureaucrat saying that since prostitution is legal, it cannot be considered offensive. Maybe, maybe not; one has to consider the source. But most noteworthy is the fact that no actual case is mentioned in the article at all, just a theoretical possibility.

I tried running some of the other names in the Telegraph article through Google and did get one important hit. The following is an article from Deutsche Welle, which is a respectable and trustworthy institution:

www.dw-world.de/english/ 0,3367,1431-184677-220493_A_951529_1_A,00.html

"A brothel owner in the historic German town of Gvrlitz on the Polish border is preparing to open his establishment next month but faces a one last serious problem -- he has no staff. Ulrich Kueperkoch's adverts seeking "hostesses for erotic services" for his Golden 3 Privatclub have been rejected by Germany's Federal Labor Office even though prostitution is legal in the country. The dispute with the labor office stems from its refusal to allow advertising for prostitutes in the network of job-placement agencies that it runs. A spokesperson said that the labor office has "decided not to be active in that market sector" due to its belief that such work could infringe on an individual's rights if he or she is forced to take the job. Kueperkoch insists he would only employ those who were interested and not those who felt they had no other choice."

So, the German employment services aren't taking postings for erotic hostesses and no one is threatened with losing their unemployment benefits for refusing to become a prostitute.

Re: Checking into the Telegraph story on labor board require


While this is an opinion, which I clearly can neither shar nor is it true at all, I've tried already to mention the source et. al. before.

Thanks for this info - and welcome to A2K!

Europe as the EU is now configured.

According to UN projections Europe's population will drop from 728 million in 2000 to 630 million in 2050.

In 2015 Europe's population will have fallen by 3.5% from what it is today.

I can understand the desire to require sources for claims made in this forum, but usually, my claims are made based on what I have learned from a wide array of sources and I rarely am able to cite the particular piece from which I learned something.

As it so happens, since writing my posting, I picked up the Jan/Feb edition of the The Atlantic, and lo and behold there I found an article entitle "A Muslim Europe?" by Russ Douthat.

I have no idea as to whether or not there is an online link to this excellent article, but you can always pick up a copy of the magazine.

Douthat cites 2000 UN projections which contend that the EU states will need 949,000 immigrants a year to maintain their 1995 population, 1,588,000 a year to maintain their 1995 working age population, and 13,480,000 a year to maintain the 1995 ratio of working age to retired residents. In other words - The Euro-Welfare State is in jeopardy.

Of course, all of these immigrants do not have to come from Islamic nations. Perhaps we will all luck out and Eastern European immigrants will overwhelm Old Europe.

According to Douthart though, while the EU population will decrease by 3.5% by 2015, the Muslim population in these countries will double.

The Muslim population in France has doubled since 1982, and more than doubled in Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Austria and Denmark.

In both Spain and Italy it has increased from 120,000 to 1 million since 1982.

Perhaps 4 or 5 decades does not constitute the "verge," but in relative terms it is a short period of time.

I suspect that between now and then we will see a resurgence of the right wing nationalism in Europe, and if neo-con efforts to spread democracy throughout the Middle East do not reach fruition, there will be hell to pay in 2050.

I read somewhere today that the Italian govt was going to start paying Italians that have babies.