For example: Bauernproteste legen Städte und Autobahnen lahm means farmers’ protests paralyze cities and freeways.
The week of rage – What’s in store for us tomorrow?
Starting tomorrow, farmers all over Germany will be taking to the barricades to demonstrate against the government’s (subvention-cutting) policy. Expected are highway blockades, rallies, protest camps and rallies all over the country. The farmers’ association expects “tens of thousands of tractors” to take part.
I know! We’ll increase the sales tax so nobody comes to your restaurant at all anymore.
No need to thank us. We’re from the government and we’re here to help.
German budget woes trigger disaster warnings for restaurants – Owners who oppose return to higher pre-pandemic VAT rate are dismissed as scaremongers by economists.
Kemal Üres, owner of a tapas bar in Hamburg, has spent the past year telling his social media followers that thousands of businesses like his will be destroyed by a planned tax increase.
The man who calls himself the “Gastroflüsterer”, or restaurant whisperer, is campaigning to make the pandemic-era cut in value added tax on restaurant meals permanent. Otherwise, the German government’s decision to raise VAT from the 7 per cent rate in place since 2020 back up to 19 per cent in January would lead to higher prices, job cuts and as many as 30,000 bankruptcies, he said.
A government with Net Zero Honesty? Good luck with that.
The truth hurts too much.
Germany Faces the Green Fiscal Truth – The constitutional court rules Berlin will have to fund net zero honestly.
Things have gone from bad to worse in Germany this week after a court ruling that’s forcing the government to do something truly shocking: level with voters about how much the net-zero energy transition will cost. Please pass the smelling salts.
Actually, that’s Italian. Meaning Schadenfreude, which is German. Meaning schadenfreude in English. Meaning malicious glee, of course. It’s complicated.
Meloni’s Italy Tastes Schadenfreude Over German Fiscal Fiasco – Stable ratings for Rome contrast with Germany’s fiscal pickle.
“Germans make mistakes too,” says professor at Bocconi.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni could be forgiven for feeling any schadenfreude this week while looking on at Germany’s unfolding budget debacle.
A string of fiscal wins for Rome has just coincided with a crisis rocking Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition in Berlin after a calamitous court judgment cast doubt on its financing plans.
That face you make when you can’t spend as much of other people’s money as you’d planned.
German court deals 60 billion euro budget blow to Scholz government – The German government froze major spending pledges focused on green initiatives and industry support on Wednesday after a constitutional court ruling on unused pandemic emergency funds blew a 60 billion euro ($65 billion) hole in its finances.
The decision threw into disarray budget negotiations taking place this week within Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s three-way ruling coalition, whose popularity has slumped as Europe’s biggest economy teeters close to another recession.
I’ll just live off the state (i.e., taxpayers). Everybody’s doing it!
Germans question value of working after new welfare increases, survey shows – More than half of Germans believe work is not worthwhile after the government’s planned increase in welfare payments and child benefits, a survey showed on Tuesday.
The government said it was raising benefits, first introduced in 2005, to fight child poverty and help citizens cope with inflation, but added it did not want to deter people from work altogether.
Welfare payments, dubbed “citizens’ money”, for more than 5.5 million jobless in Germany will rise to 563 euros ($605.06)from 502 euros per month for single people from next year.
PS: What you may not be aware of is that those who receive welfare payments in Germany also get their rent, healthcare and other entitlements paid for in addition.
Step two: Once rent prices explode due to step one, introduce a rent freeze to end the few meager building projects still in operation.
Go Social Democracy!
Germany’s ruling party plans to curb rent increases – SPD set to unveil measures to tackle soaring costs facing tenants, says senior lawmaker.
Germany’s ruling Social Democratic party is set to propose a three-year rent break across the country, as tenants struggle to cope with the soaring cost of housing in Europe’s largest economy.
“We need to create breathing room — we need a rent freeze for the next three years,” senior SPD lawmaker Verena Hubertz told Bild am Sonntag, adding that Chancellor Olaf Scholz would outline measures on Monday to tackle the country’s cost of living crisis.
Sidelined Greens lose faith in the German coalition – Governing partners accuse each other of ‘crowbar’ politics and ‘exploiting social qualms’
The German Greens once thought they were in the driving seat of Olaf Scholz’s coalition. Some now feel like back-seat passengers on a political road to nowhere.
“There’s a lot of frustration,” said Rasmus Andresen, a Green member of the European parliament. “This coalition promised progress and a fresh start, but, to be honest, I don’t see much evidence of that now.”
The source of their anger is the series of painful concessions forced on them late last month by their coalition partners, Scholz’s Social Democrats and the liberal FDP, which dismayed senior Green leaders and enraged the party’s rank and file.
Scholz is for many Greens the cause of their plight. They once saw him as a natural ally — he had, after all, campaigned at the last election to become Germany’s “climate chancellor”. But these days they increasingly see him as an obstacle, ready to sell out Green interests for the sake of political peace.
“Scholz has sided with the FDP,” said Reinhard Bütikofer, another Green MEP. “The FDP and SPD obviously decided they could score political points by exploiting social qualms about climate policy. But that’s populism.”
Those windmill thingies are kind of like trees so deal with it, conservationists. You can’t have both. Boy, these Greens sure have come a long way, haven’t they?
Germany’s wind energy: Conservationists fear for forests – Germany is counting on wind energy to help replace fossil fuels. But critics say massive investment in the sector is ignoring a different environmental crisis.
By 2032, the government wants to have 2% of land area allocated for onshore wind power. This means installing between 1,000 and 1,500 new turbines a year, or four to five a day by 2030, as German Chancellor Olaf Scholz recently said.
Germany needs wind energy to meet its goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2045, a target it’s currently in danger of missing, according to multiple studies. The country also missed its emissions reduction targets the last two years in a row, according to think tank Agora Energiewende.
“If Germany fails to meet its climate targets, we will not be able to demand that others meet theirs,” Germany’s Economy and Climate Minister Robert Habeck said in February.
Like duh. Always has been. Otherwise they wouldn’t call it Berlin.
The street violence in Berlin on New Year’s Eve has triggered a debate on law and order ahead of regional elections in several states, including Berlin. Bavaria’s center-right Premier, Markus Söder from the Christian Social Union (CSU), lashed out at the center-left government in Berlin claiming it could “neither organize elections nor guarantee the safety of its citizens”.
Observing Hermann 