Jobs for Jobless People?

February 21, 2010: Vice Chancellor’s Idea and Partisan Barriers

It was often mentioned several days ago that our vice chancellor and Foreign Secretary Westerwelle wants to disburden the middle class. This is one of the topics he already mentioned at the voting campaigns. Altough being a keeper for industry and the rich, he might not be that wrong saying that government can not only give money all the time. He now uses this point to reason the need of jobless people getting work. Permanently unemployed people should do some social job to receive their unemployment payments, e.g. shovel snow.

If I get him right, then he wants the state to create new public jobs for jobless people. This however, does not really match the usual attitude of the liberal party (FDP) he belongs to: regarding the market as the solution, but maybe he is just pragmatic one time.

Discipline within Parliamentary Groups

What’s now happening is the usual action when problems should be discussed. Both sides are only bashing each other and go round in circles. Instead of negotiating about chances and problems they just see the opponent that has to be fought. In Germany we only know party rivalry: You ought not to agree with the opponent!

This is connected with a principle in German politics which is not known in many other states (except Britain). You usually have to agree with your parliamentary group, e.g. if the leader says “We will agree on law proposal 123”, then you should better vote for this proposal, otherwise you might not be selected as candidate the next period. In the past this was called “Fraktionszwang” (restraint within parliamentary group), but since each Member of Parliament should decide freely it is now called “Fraktionsdiziplin” (discipline within parliamentary group). The values however remain the same.

March 7, 2010: SPD member now agreeing

After some weeks of fights a member of the SPD (the social-democratic party) has now agreed with Westerwelle’s ideas. Hannelore Kraft says that permanently unemployed persons could work—paid by the state—in retirements castles and e.g. read books to older people. Both SPD and the Greens agreed with the Kraft’s plan to create work for permanently unemployed people who have no chances to find work on the regular market anymore.

However, CDU and Die Linke (left wing party) still refuse the plans with the CDU claiming that it was “intolerable” not to give a fourth of all jobless any chances anymore. Considering that such different parties as FDP and SPD agree one time (compare discipline with parliamentary group above) shows that Westerwelle’s, my and SPD opinion might not be too wrong.

Another interesting aspect is that according to Wowereit the whole idea has already been performed in Berlin. Even more interesting is that the government of Berlin consists of SPD (who support the proposal now) and Die Linke (who refuse it on federal level). Seems like Die Linke suffers from a lack of definition about what is social.

Really impossible? Unsocial?

I guess many people would be happy to have a job and get their money exactly for this job. It is a better feeling to know you are useful for something and you have deserved your money instead of just sitting at home. Some people might agree with the latter one, but this is probably the minority.

The thing we have to understand in my opinion is that there is also work apart from the free market. Possibly, you could say that some day some company could use this hole as their base, but why not filling it up with jobless people at first?

Of course you should not choose jobs where future companies will emerge, but there are other branches. Yet, to achieve this goal there is plenty of discussion needed, and that’s where the problems begin, because political parties in Germany are better at fighting each other than working with each other.

Service Wasteland Germany—Reducing Costs

You might have already heard of the term Service Wasteland Germany (Servicewüste Deutschland). In case you haven’t, you will feel it if you will live in Germany one day.

Companies in Germany are—even more than politicians—fascinated by modernization and especially by reducing costs. However, not for the sake of customers, but instead for their own wallet. Moreover, the technology is often more complicated than communication with a person and it also cannot check the best variants all the time.

On the other hand it is only a matter of how much you are familiar with a specific technology, I am sure many people do not feel as easy as me when searching for prices on the internet, while I find it very handy. It is better than discussing with a clerk or using a vending machine, because I have all time I need at the PC.

Drawbacks of Machines

However, there are also concerns with regard to privacy when you buy your products via internet. For example, buying train tickets via internet or by credit card at the vending machine leads to the problem that the railroad company knows where you travel. If you pay with cash, nobody will be able to find out that exactly you have bought 7 tickets to Berlin, 5 tickets to Paris, one to Prague, two to Vienna etc.

Besides, if the machine does not work you really have a problem. Let’s stay with the example of trains: If you are at a train station and the vending machine is not working, you cannot buy a valid ticket. It is then your duty in Germany to search for a ticket inspector and tell your problem–immediately after entering. This would be easy if there were inspectors in all trains all the time, but sometimes you cannot find an inspector, because railway companies (not only Deutsche Bahn, but also smaller ones) want to reduce costs. I think you then should go to the train conductor, but I am not sure if that’s right or if you are not allowed to disturb him. And that’s when the problems arouse!

Content Customer will Return

German shops and service providers do not seem to understand that only content customers will return. An American study has shown that 100 uncontent customers could lead to 30 people not coming to the shop. This does not mean that all of these 30 people were really customers before, but they might have heard of other people how bad the service is and decide on going somewhere else.

Instead, they tend to see the possible loss of material value. I read a story where the children of a man had been criticized for only touching a package in a toyshop, not damaging it. This of course leads to a disappointed customer who might not come back to this shop the next time.

Switching barriers

Some companies also hope to find their luck in so called switching barriers which include both emotional and financial aspects. In an interview, the economist Joachim Büschken claimed that satisfaction was not a reason for customers to come back anymore, because other companies would copy your ideas quickly. Thus, according to him, it is more important to create so called hard switching barriers by menu navigation, proprietary adapters etc.

One example are printers which only work with their own cartridges: While the printer itself is pretty cheap, you have to pay a lot for the cartridges since you cannot switch anymore. The economist gives cars as a bad example, because each car is pretty similar and the user can handle each car by knowing one.

Of course, this attitude can be criticized a lot, because it makes world more complex and only focuses on the capitalistic view of economy.

Problem for our Psychic Condition

The reduction of social interaction is also a problem for our psychic, because by always communcating with machines we suffer from a lack of neurotransmitters for happiness. This means by always using machines for interaction we destroy ourselves.

A solution for this problem could be the human robots (called androids) developed by scientists in Japan (Repliee R1-Q2), USA (Albert Hubo) and South Korea (EveR-1). They act  and look like humans thus leading to a feeling as if we were talking with a real person.

Eight Subjective Reasons for not Having Children

This is a list of unordered and very probably also incomplete reasons for not having children in Germany. Moreover, it is totally subjective and manipulated by medial coverage. Comparing real statistics you might find out how wrong some of these reasons are.

• supervision: Parents have to look after their children until they are 18. This is called Aufsichtspflicht and can lead to judicial consequences if the children do something illegal. You are e.g. guilty if your four-year old child plays in garden without being supervised and then leaves the garden.
• liability: Having a internet access at home you have to make sure that your child does not do anything illegal. Otherwise you as the owner of the access might be sued (if the real culprit cannot be found). This is e.g. a major problem with regard to copyright law.
• dislike against children: There have been several cases when people sued kindergartens because they did not want the noise of the children in their area. The kindergartens either had to leave the location or hide the children inside the house instead of letting them play in the garden. The same is valid for playgrounds.
• hatred in school: Childrens are faced with hatred and bullying in school nowadays. Having an intelligent child, there is a high possibility that it will be bullied due to its intelligence by the less smart ones. Teachers meanwhile try to ignore the problem as good as possible.
• stultification of society: Besides, you have to ask yourself if you want to rise a child in a society which is becoming more dumb. Either your child adapts to the stupidity or it will have problems finding close friends.
• future: Considering the reluctance of many people to put effort into their work and many limitations the state puts upon us, there is a high possibility that other states will overtake us. It is thus possible that a child in Germany would not have a good future.
• flexibility: You are often forced to be very flexible in industry. Of course this is not better in emerging countries, but it still is a problem for having children. On the one hand there are not enough places for children, on the other hand you should not stop working.
• youth violence: Do you really want your child to grow up in a world where there is youth violence all around? Especially lower class children (including both Germans and immigrants) tend to demolate mostly public property (windows, lamps, …). Besides, they also beat up and kill people who “look strange” (this is their answer) or want to help their victims.

Besides, these problems of course exist in many societies and can be dealt with. Where some of these problems do not exist, you will find other ones.

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Development of Marriage and Divorces

Development of Marriages in Germany

As in most other industrialized countries, the number of marriages in Germany has been decresing for many years. The peak was reached in 1950 with 11 of 1000 citizens getting married per year (about 750,000 on the whole), nowadays there are only 4.6 of 1000 left (equals ca. 377,000).

Couples are also getting married later: In 1970 the average age at marriage (East and West Germany together) was about 25 for men and 22 for women, nowadays it’s 32.7 and 29.8.

The following graphic shows the development of marriages in Germany. There’s a rise in marriages in the 90s, because West and East Germany were united and before 1992 these statistics include only West Germany.

However, you also have to consider that German society is always getting older and therefore there are not so many people left who could still marry.

Statistics by Federal Statistical Office Germany

Development of Divorces in Germany

Divorces meanwhile have nearly doubled from 1950 to 2008.

The graphic shows the development of marriage in Germany, once again taking only numbers of West Germany before 1990, which makes it seem even more extremous. To be able to get the number of whole Germany before 1990 you have to add about 25,000–40,000.

Statistics by Federal Statistical Office Germany

The minimum in 1978 can be explained by a reform of the marriage law which lead to a temporary decline of divorces. However, already between 1980 and 1982 the old level was reached again.

Are Divorces Modern?

Some sociologists say the number of divorces was an indicator for the modernity of society. They claim it showed in how far society has dealt with the rights of women. Probably, in their eyes it’s also about “getting rid of religion”, but I cannot prove it.

The statement itself might be true, but in a positve way? In my opinion the number of divorces just shows our incapability of coping with problems. In modern society everything has to work perfectly, without much struggle; a part of society does not want to put any effort into their actions at all.

However this apathy when one should act stops love from developing at all. Love is something that has to grow and gets stronger with each problem you solve. Current world is spoilt by romantic hollywood movies showing a world through rose-coloured glasses. Movies and series also paint an image of marriage being the worst possibility ever, they pretend that the state of having butterflies in one’s stomach should last forever. Thus, not being able to reach this dream world, some people give up along the way.

Problems for parents and children

Moreover, divorces are in my opinion not good for the children. We have an increasing number of so called Patchwork-Familien (stepfamiles) consisting of one parent and some children of both families. However, the children still meet with their real mother/father often, which shows that there is still a strong relationship which cannot be replaced by the new family.

Some parents decide to raise their children alone, which leads to new problems, because their income is basically smaller and they do not have enough time to care for their children alone. There have been reports that the social help of the state for single mothers and fathers is far too little.

Future?

It will be interesting to see if this decline of marriages and rise of divorces will go on or there will be a return to long-time marriage again. Another interesting question is in how far the development would change if politics changed the fiscal law from having a special status for married couples to having a special status for couples with children—which is being demanded by some groups.