Update: Why Germans Always Pay Cash?

Because they can. Take cash-stuffed German mega-companies, for instance.

Cash

They’re buying everything they can find in US-Amerika these days that hasn’t been tied down.

In recent days, two multibillion-dollar deals were announced. On Sunday, the German engineering conglomerate Siemens announced a $7.6 billion acquisition of the Dresser-Rand Group, the United States oil products company. And on Monday morning, Merck of Germany, the chemical and drug giant, said it would pay $17 billion for Sigma-Aldrich, an American life sciences company.

PS: Remember when Japan was going to take over the United States? No, I guess you wouldn’t remember that. Never mind.

Germans Really Are Industrious

Even when it comes to industrial piracy.

Piracy

German companies are ranked second in the world for industrial plagiarism, a global study released today has found (only China does it better). The numbers indicate that 1 in 4 plagiarized tech goods are made in Germany.

Of course the only problem with this study is that it was made by the the Federation of German Machine and Equipment Builders (or VDMA) so it may have been plagiarized itself.

And no, this wasn’t in the news tonight.

Für den Ideenklau ist oft nicht ein Produzent im fernen China, sondern der Konkurrent um die Ecke verantwortlich.

Is The Party Over?

While Germany has so far led the regional recovery, it is feeling the pain of increasing political tension. The European Union agreed last week on its widest-ranging sanctions yet over Russia’s backing of rebels in eastern Ukraine. Russia counts Germany as its biggest trading partner in Europe.

Germany

“The manufacturing-sector outlook does not look encouraging.”

Die Konjunktur läuft nicht mehr rund – Industrie-Aufträge mit stärkstem Minus seit 2011

More Benevolent Über-Government Intervention In Action

It goes like this: An EU regulation forces Osram and the rest of the industry to shift from traditional light bulbs to light-emitting diodes. They are smaller, more energy-efficient, have longer lifespans than traditional bulbs (except that they don’t really), are very much more expensive and must therefore be forced down the consumer’s throat and, well, everybody here hates the damned things and wants their old light bulbs back.

Light

The benevolent part? Now 8,000 Osram workers lose their jobs because of this.

„Durch die EU-Verordnung ist das traditionelle Glühbirnen-Massengeschäft von Osram weggebrochen. Dort war Osram führend.“

Our CO2 Doesn’t Stink

Or maybe it’s green or something. At any rate, Germany just managed to block the adoption of new emissions limits for cars produced in the European Union. This was necessary because, well, this legislation would have handicaped Germany’s automobile industry, focused as it is on the luxury car sector.

Cars

Germany has long seen itself as a leader when it comes to efforts to reduce CO2 emissions and combat climate change. Indeed, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government remains committed to radically expanding its reliance on renewable energies in the coming decades.

But when it comes to reducing the amount of greenhouse gases German-made automobiles produce, Berlin is far less ambitious.

“It is a scandal.”

“Dramatically Poor”

German exports fell in September at the fastest pace since late last year, official figures show, adding to evidence that the eurozone crisis has infected the continent’s economic powerhouse.

September imports fell 1.6% and exports declined 2.5% month-on-month, seasonally adjusted data from the Federal Statistics Office showed. Overall exports were down 3.4% from a year earlier but orders from eurozone countries plunged 9.1%.

“The trade figures are a normal consequence of the dramatically poor industrial orders, which have fallen at their sharpest rate in a year.”

Bundeswehr On The Front Line Again

When it comes to fighting for German weapon system exports, I mean. Talk about your military industrial complex. The Germans sure have one – and are clearly in denial about it – which is the real news item here if you ask me. Take the latest sale of frigates to Algeria, for instance (I mean please).

These pacifistic (German made) and very expensive peaceships not only make big profits for traditional Waffenschmiede (weapons makers) like Thyssen-Krupp Marine-Systeme, they finally give Germany’s alibi army something vernünftig (reasonable) to do: Train the folks who might actually be using these weapons one day – and in a thoroughly German thorough way, too, I am sure.

Who says the Bundeswehr isn’t an effective force? No, not a fighting one, as a sales force.

“Die Ausbildung wird in Deutschland und auf Hoher See stattfinden.”

Germany Drains Spain’s Brains

In a ghoulish plan to intensify their already ironclad grip of an anemic Europe, depraved German industrialists have now begun luring unsuspecting southern European engineers to Germany by offering them well-paid jobs which will allow them (the depraved Germans) to drain their brains at leasure.

To make matters worse, if that were possible, another grisly gimmick has also been introduced in which so-called “blue cards” (green had already been taken) are being offered to skilled non-EU workers, as well. Although ostinsibly intended to “make the immigration process” easier, this “blue card” babble is clearly just another cynical euphemism for more German brain draining activity.

The gruesome brain-sucking capitalist bastards.

In December, a planeload of 100 Spanish engineers flew to nearby Stuttgart for a weekend of job interviews. Within a month, about a third of them had been hired. And some German companies have been making connections over the Internet, simply plucking Spanish, Portuguese, Greek and Italian professionals from sites like LinkedIn.