For most of this century, Germany racked up one economic success after another, dominating global markets for high-end products like luxury cars and industrial machinery, selling so much to the rest of the world that half the economy ran on exports.
Jobs were plentiful, the government’s financial coffers grew as other European countries drowned in debt, and books were written about what other countries could learn from Germany.
No longer. Now, Germany is the world’s worst-performing major developed economy, with both the International Monetary Fund and European Union expecting it to shrink this year.
You don’t do business in Germany then because I’ve been hearing otherwise of late.
Like most other countries, we’ve had to deal with COVID, inflation+countermeasures and climate troubles. And as an export nation, we’ve likely even been hit relatively badly by such global issues.
So, of course, not everything is entirely rosy. And of course, you’ll find people complaining.
But this article makes it sound like we’ve entered a massive crisis. As if the Germany of today looks like a poor nation compared to the Germany five years ago. And that’s just not the case. We’re still filthy rich compared to most countries. Our current government is pushing the country forward again (after 16 years of stagnation before the pandemic). The fruition of these measures will obviously take some years to kick in, and we will now have to deal with climate change, whether we like it or not, but ultimately, it feels like our economy (+ the things that actually matter) are on an upward trend again.