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... of eastern Europe and the tiger economies of East Asia. If Germany doesn't mend its ways, runs the argument, then the whole economic mansion will collapse. Partly as a result of this nationwide fear - which was heightened by the recession of 1993 - flexible deals were struck which would previously have been unthinkable. Saturday working suddenly became possible.
Pay rises were smaller than ever before. Atthe end of last year Germany's biggest union, IG Metall, made a historic concession: it offered to forgo an increase in real wages in return for the promise of jobs. Chancellor Helmut Kohl is due to host further talks on the employer-union "alliance forgoes" on Tuesday. But even with all the new-look deals, the mystery remains. How come the economic miracle has not long On cost, for example, few would dispute that Britain has a clear edge. Japanese manufacturers, looking for a foothold in Europe, long ago started flocking to Britain in recognition of that fact.
Germany's Siemens is merely following the trend. And yet was BMW that took over the Rover Group - not the other way round. The very idea of a British firm taking over a big German company remains unthinkable. German analysts tend to be thrown by the question of why this should be.
It is like asking: "Where British houses daughter than houses elsewhere in Europe?" or "Why do the French not mind about presidential mistresses?" It's just the way things are, a national badge. Germans have become accustomed to the idea of their own economic superiority -and so has everybody else. When you live, work and shop in Germany, the paradoxes become obvious. Myths about efficiency crumble quickly. Deutsche Telekom takes an eternity to do simple jobs; more complicated tasks take a little longer. Electricians and plumbers never turn up.
Shops treat their customers with Communist- style disdain. "Browsers welcome" is not a familiar motto; linger, and you risk being thrown out. And if you bring back an item that does not work, don't expect an apology; what you get will be theatrical sighs and mutterings about the trouble you have caused. Most Western countries have become used to thinking of good service as a key element of a strong economy, but Germany serves as a reminder to us that the connection is not absolute. The country's export capability is in no way affected by its plumbers " unreliability or the rudeness of its shop assistants. And when it comes to manufacturing exports, make no mistake: Germany still succeeds. Latest figures, for October, show a year-on-year increase of 10 per cent.
Foreigners and Germans alike are convinced that German products are simply better. Even a product touched by Germanness at one remove is perceived to have been blessed. A German car salesman tells of a customer looking at a Rover and announcing: "Because the Germans are involved - now I can trust this car. " Buying German is not considered adult, but a privilege. Hans-Jurgen Meltzer of Deutsche Bank Research points out: "The [German] cars are too expensive. Everybody knows that. But people accept it. " In global terms, it seems plausible that Western Europe's share of manufactured exports will continue to decline, as the Asian economic sun rises.
Back on European home turf, however, Germany stays defiantly ahead. Germany has around a 10 per cent share world manufactured exports; Britain has little more than half that. Jurgen Pfister, responsible at Commerzbank for analysis of the German economy, believes: "We live from this image, 'Made in Germany'. But the advantage, if we still have one, is smaller than it was. " Mr Pfister points out that the problems of the Germaneconomy are real. "At the edges, it's crumbling. A million jobs have been lost since 1993 - half of them long- term. " BUT IF the edges are crumbling the heart of the German economy may not be.
According to a popular German saying, "Those who have been pronounced dead live longer. " The sentiment may apply to the German economy itself. The budget deficit has set alarm bells ringing again, but given the hundreds of billions of marks that have been poured into the east, it could be argued that it is surprising that the budget deficit is as low as it is. And those exports... In the search for an explanation one ventures on to the treacherously thin ice of national stereotypes. There is, it seems, no way to avoid the question of Grundlichkeit. Grundlichkeit, or "thoroughness", is a trait which Germans themselves mention when defining their own national character.
If, in Germany, you called out "Grundlichkeit" in a game of word-associations, somebody would certainly respond with "deutsch." It is more than just a state of mind. One worker at BMW talks with shock of his first look inside a Rover engine. "It was as though somebody had just thrown it together, any old how. " Now, he says admiringly of the latest engines: "It's like looking inside a cigarette packet, it's so neat. That makes it visually better - but technically better, too. Things are less likely to go wrong. " Under these terms Grundlichkeit equals neat design, equals neat performance, equals neat sales, equals a good joan Germans tend to believe that what they do, they do best. They thus have a confident sales pitch.
When asked to comment on Rover's weaknesses, the BMW chairman, Mr Pischetsrieder, accuses Rover of insularity, in the literal sense. "In its business policies, Rover - like all British industry - was very clearly concentrated on the British Isles. Many international There is as much tortoise as hare in Germany's dogged sense of commitment to the final goal. "Discipline" is a historically loaded word, but an obvious truth has to be acknowledged: Discipline, first cousin of Grundlichkeit, has helped to get Germany where it is today. Which puts Britain in a quandary. For it seems that the lack of discipline - the offbeat, the irreverent, the awkward - is an essential part of modern British society. One only needs to compare German TV advertisements (stolid, respectable) and British advertisements (an abundance of parody and self- parody) to see that the cultural differences are real. Are the British - still tainted, in the German perception, by "sloppiness", or Schlamperei - ready to knuckle down to a bit Grundlichkeit?
Instead, it seems that disciplined Germany will remain the de facto European class prefect - imposing lots of rules, keeping things vaguely on track and enjoying appropriate privileges. Britain, meanwhile, can do its own thing, throwing paper darts fromthe back of the class, larking about and maybe scraping through the exams at the end of the day. It might not be such a bad Meanwhile, it is cheering for Britons to read about Germany's problems, so cheering to some indeed that it it is odd to think that Schadenfreude is not a native English word. But however gloriously grim the headline news about the "tottering giant" may seem, the word uberholen, or " overtaking", is not one that Britons can expect to need in the near future. And as for the prospect of a lean and powerful British Rover taking over a German BMW - maybe, one day. But Sigmund Engel and his compatriots agent lying awake at night worrying about it.
Steve Crawshaw, Is Germany sinking? . , Independent on Sunday, 01 - 21 - 1996, pp 17. Copyright 1998 Infonautics Corporation. All rights reserved. - Terms and Conditions Bibliography:
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Research essay sample on German Economy Budget Deficit
