Bund - Politik - FAZ.NET - Wiedergewählt mit 95,5 Prozent: SPD schart sich um Beck
26. Oktober 2007 Der SPD-Bundesparteitag in Hamburg hat am Freitag Kurt Beck mit großer Mehrheit als Vorsitzenden wiedergewählt. Der rheinland-pfälzische Ministerpräsident erhielt 483 von 506 gültigen Stimmen. Es gab 6 Enthaltungen, 17 votierten gegen ihn. Das entspricht einer Zustimmung von 95,5 Prozent.
Friday, October 26, 2007
sueddeutsche.de SPD-Parteitag Standing Ovations für Altkanzler Schröder - Deutschland
sueddeutsche.de SPD-Parteitag Standing Ovations für Altkanzler Schröder - Deutschland
Mit Grußworten des Hamburger Spitzenkandidaten Naumann und von Altkanzler Schröder hat der dreitägige SPD-Bundesparteitag in Hamburg begonnen. Die Partei scheint mit ihrem alten Chef versöhnt.
Mit Grußworten des Hamburger Spitzenkandidaten Naumann und von Altkanzler Schröder hat der dreitägige SPD-Bundesparteitag in Hamburg begonnen. Die Partei scheint mit ihrem alten Chef versöhnt.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
sueddeutsche.de SPD-Streit zum Arbeitslosengeld I Müntefering zweifelt an Finanzierbarkeit - Deutschland
sueddeutsche.de SPD-Streit zum Arbeitslosengeld I Müntefering zweifelt an Finanzierbarkeit - Deutschland
Wenige Tage vor dem SPD-Parteitag gehen die Diskussionen um Veränderungen an der Agenda 2010 weiter. Vizekanzler Müntefering knüpft die Umsetzung eines verlängerten Arbeitslosengeldes I an die Finanzierbarkeit - die Hessen-SPD stellt derweil bereits weitere Forderungen auf.
Wenige Tage vor dem SPD-Parteitag gehen die Diskussionen um Veränderungen an der Agenda 2010 weiter. Vizekanzler Müntefering knüpft die Umsetzung eines verlängerten Arbeitslosengeldes I an die Finanzierbarkeit - die Hessen-SPD stellt derweil bereits weitere Forderungen auf.
sueddeutsche.de Tokio Hotel Mehr als ein Phänomen - Leben & Stil
sueddeutsche.de Tokio Hotel Mehr als ein Phänomen - Leben & Stil
Französische Kinder lernen die deutsche Sprache, um die Texte verstehen zu können, die Band wird für zwei Awards bei dem MTV-Awards nominiert. Tokio Hotel hat sich etabliert - zu Recht.
Französische Kinder lernen die deutsche Sprache, um die Texte verstehen zu können, die Band wird für zwei Awards bei dem MTV-Awards nominiert. Tokio Hotel hat sich etabliert - zu Recht.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Monday, October 22, 2007
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Beck erklärt ALG-I-Streit für beendet
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Beck erklärt ALG-I-Streit für beendet
Der SPD-Vorstand hat sich im Streit über das Arbeitslosengeld I mit großer Mehrheit hinter Parteichef Kurt Beck gestellt. Geht es nach Beck, ist die wochenlange parteiinterne Diskussion damit beendet. Aber die Auseinandersetzung mit dem Koalitionspartner steht noch bevor.
Der SPD-Vorstand hat sich im Streit über das Arbeitslosengeld I mit großer Mehrheit hinter Parteichef Kurt Beck gestellt. Geht es nach Beck, ist die wochenlange parteiinterne Diskussion damit beendet. Aber die Auseinandersetzung mit dem Koalitionspartner steht noch bevor.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Gespräch mit Andrea Nahles ''Das ist ein bisschen wie Almauftrieb'' - Deutschland - sueddeutsche.de
Gespräch mit Andrea Nahles ''Das ist ein bisschen wie Almauftrieb'' - Deutschland - sueddeutsche.de
Andrea Nahles, designierte SPD-Vizechefin, über das Gute und das Schlechte an der Agenda 2010, die neue Macht von Kurt Beck, Aufschwung für alle, den Parteitag und Schulspeisungen.
Andrea Nahles, designierte SPD-Vizechefin, über das Gute und das Schlechte an der Agenda 2010, die neue Macht von Kurt Beck, Aufschwung für alle, den Parteitag und Schulspeisungen.
Lissabon EU-Reformvertrag steht - Ausland - sueddeutsche.de
Lissabon EU-Reformvertrag steht - Ausland - sueddeutsche.de
19.10.2007
Lissabon
EU-Reformvertrag steht
Der EU-Reformvertrag steht: Nach sechs Jahren des Ringens haben sich die Staats- und Regierungschefs der Europäischen Union in der Nacht zum Freitag auf einen Vertragstext verständigt. Bundeskanzlerin Angela Merkel bezeichnete die Einigung, die beim Gipfel in Lissabon erzielt wurde, als "großen Erfolg".
19.10.2007
Lissabon
EU-Reformvertrag steht
Der EU-Reformvertrag steht: Nach sechs Jahren des Ringens haben sich die Staats- und Regierungschefs der Europäischen Union in der Nacht zum Freitag auf einen Vertragstext verständigt. Bundeskanzlerin Angela Merkel bezeichnete die Einigung, die beim Gipfel in Lissabon erzielt wurde, als "großen Erfolg".
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Business in Germany | Locusts in lederhosen | Economist.com
Business in Germany | Locusts in lederhosen | Economist.com
Locusts in lederhosen
Oct 18th 2007 | FRANKFURT
From The Economist print edition
German bosses are learning from private equity
TWO years ago Germany was gripped by a fierce debate over whether aggressive private-equity investors—dubbed “locusts” by a politician—were good or bad for the country. An activist fund from London blocked Deutsche Börse's bid for the London Stock Exchange and caused the departure of its chief executive, Werner Seifert, and its chairman. Mr Seifert wrote a vitriolic book, “Invasion of the Locusts”, catching the mood of the time. Since then, however, German bosses have learned from the locusts. They are making their own raids and using private-equity techniques to ginger up German companies.
Next week the European Court of Justice is expected to order the German government to abolish the Volkswagen law of 1960. This limits the voting rights of any single VW shareholder to 20%, protecting Germany's biggest carmaker from being taken over. Lifting this cap will allow Porsche, which already owns 31% of the shares, to win control.
Wendelin Wiedeking, chief executive of Porsche, began building a stake in VW two years ago. He plans to put the two carmakers under the same holding company, called Porsche Automobil Holding. In doing so, he would dilute the power of VW's workforce. Co-determination, the practice of giving workers a big say in the management of German firms, is probably the oddest feature of the country for foreign investors. Only three members of the merged company's 12-strong supervisory board would represent VW workers, compared with ten out of 20 at VW now.
Mr Wiedeking's strategy is the most obviously locust-like among German executives, but there are other examples. Eckhard Cordes, a former executive at DaimlerChrysler, a car firm, is riding roughshod into Metro, a retail group. He has the backing of the company's biggest shareholders—and these are not scary private-equity firms but two wealthy German families. Thomas Middelhoff, chief executive of Arcandor, another retailer, executed a private-equityish restructuring two years ago, loading the firm with debt then flogging assets to pay it off. Now he is in the mood to buy bits of other retail companies. Last year Manfred Wennemer, chief executive of Continental, a car-parts supplier, successfully repelled some potential private-equity buyers but seems to have learned a thing or two from them. This year his firm took on a pile of debt to buy Siemens VDO, an auto-electronics firm, for €11.4 billion ($16.2 billion).
More change is on its way. Nine of the 30 biggest listed German companies which make up the DAX stockmarket index have recently changed their chief executive or will do so soon. The new bosses are expected to shake things up. At Siemens, a giant engineering company, Peter Löscher will streamline the conglomerate's nine divisions into three. At BMW, Norbert Reithofer is expected to start a new brand of car to add to the group's BMWs, Minis and Rolls-Royces. At RWE, a power company, Jürgen Grossmann is likely to make use of the acquisition expertise he gained buying a division of Klöckner, a steelmaker, in 1993.
A new corporate structure, the Societas Europaea (SE), which has been adopted by Porsche Automobil Holding, could help German companies break further away from co-determination. Big firms must now have not only a management board but also a supervisory board of 20 members, half of them workers' representatives. Changing to SE status allows firms to negotiate a cut in workers' representation or even to do away with a supervisory board altogether. Allianz, a big insurer, was the first big company to move to the new structure, followed by Fresenius Medical Care. BASF, a chemicals company, plans to make the change next year.
In two years the names in the DAX could look very different, and not just because the initials AG (for Aktiengesellschaft) are replaced by SE. A big sell-out to foreign locusts is far less likely now, because German companies have learned to do the job themselves.
Copyright © 2007 The Economist Newspaper and The Economist Group. All rights reserved.
Locusts in lederhosen
Oct 18th 2007 | FRANKFURT
From The Economist print edition
German bosses are learning from private equity
TWO years ago Germany was gripped by a fierce debate over whether aggressive private-equity investors—dubbed “locusts” by a politician—were good or bad for the country. An activist fund from London blocked Deutsche Börse's bid for the London Stock Exchange and caused the departure of its chief executive, Werner Seifert, and its chairman. Mr Seifert wrote a vitriolic book, “Invasion of the Locusts”, catching the mood of the time. Since then, however, German bosses have learned from the locusts. They are making their own raids and using private-equity techniques to ginger up German companies.
Next week the European Court of Justice is expected to order the German government to abolish the Volkswagen law of 1960. This limits the voting rights of any single VW shareholder to 20%, protecting Germany's biggest carmaker from being taken over. Lifting this cap will allow Porsche, which already owns 31% of the shares, to win control.
Wendelin Wiedeking, chief executive of Porsche, began building a stake in VW two years ago. He plans to put the two carmakers under the same holding company, called Porsche Automobil Holding. In doing so, he would dilute the power of VW's workforce. Co-determination, the practice of giving workers a big say in the management of German firms, is probably the oddest feature of the country for foreign investors. Only three members of the merged company's 12-strong supervisory board would represent VW workers, compared with ten out of 20 at VW now.
Mr Wiedeking's strategy is the most obviously locust-like among German executives, but there are other examples. Eckhard Cordes, a former executive at DaimlerChrysler, a car firm, is riding roughshod into Metro, a retail group. He has the backing of the company's biggest shareholders—and these are not scary private-equity firms but two wealthy German families. Thomas Middelhoff, chief executive of Arcandor, another retailer, executed a private-equityish restructuring two years ago, loading the firm with debt then flogging assets to pay it off. Now he is in the mood to buy bits of other retail companies. Last year Manfred Wennemer, chief executive of Continental, a car-parts supplier, successfully repelled some potential private-equity buyers but seems to have learned a thing or two from them. This year his firm took on a pile of debt to buy Siemens VDO, an auto-electronics firm, for €11.4 billion ($16.2 billion).
More change is on its way. Nine of the 30 biggest listed German companies which make up the DAX stockmarket index have recently changed their chief executive or will do so soon. The new bosses are expected to shake things up. At Siemens, a giant engineering company, Peter Löscher will streamline the conglomerate's nine divisions into three. At BMW, Norbert Reithofer is expected to start a new brand of car to add to the group's BMWs, Minis and Rolls-Royces. At RWE, a power company, Jürgen Grossmann is likely to make use of the acquisition expertise he gained buying a division of Klöckner, a steelmaker, in 1993.
A new corporate structure, the Societas Europaea (SE), which has been adopted by Porsche Automobil Holding, could help German companies break further away from co-determination. Big firms must now have not only a management board but also a supervisory board of 20 members, half of them workers' representatives. Changing to SE status allows firms to negotiate a cut in workers' representation or even to do away with a supervisory board altogether. Allianz, a big insurer, was the first big company to move to the new structure, followed by Fresenius Medical Care. BASF, a chemicals company, plans to make the change next year.
In two years the names in the DAX could look very different, and not just because the initials AG (for Aktiengesellschaft) are replaced by SE. A big sell-out to foreign locusts is far less likely now, because German companies have learned to do the job themselves.
Copyright © 2007 The Economist Newspaper and The Economist Group. All rights reserved.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
DIW: Wirtschaftswachstum bleibt robust | Wirtschaft | Deutsche Welle | 16.10.2007
DIW: Wirtschaftswachstum bleibt robust | Wirtschaft | Deutsche Welle | 16.10.2007
Das Wirtschaftswachstum in Deutschland bleibt Experten zufolge zwar auch in den kommenden beiden Jahren robust, fällt im Vergleich zu 2007 aber etwas ab. Ungewiss sei, wie viel von dem Boom bei Arbeitnehmern ankomme.
Das Wirtschaftswachstum in Deutschland bleibt Experten zufolge zwar auch in den kommenden beiden Jahren robust, fällt im Vergleich zu 2007 aber etwas ab. Ungewiss sei, wie viel von dem Boom bei Arbeitnehmern ankomme.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
The German left | Troubled times | Economist.com
The German left | Troubled times | Economist.com
The German left
Troubled times
Oct 11th 2007 | BERLIN AND DUISBURG
From The Economist print edition
Why the rise of the Left Party has cast the Social Democrats into a gloom
Get article background
ASK Ralf Pietras why the Left Party is growing in Duisburg and he offers a ready answer. The coal mines are exhausted, steel is forged by machine and old folk scavenge for bottles to reclaim the deposits. Duisburg, a gritty town at the junction of the Rhine and the Ruhr, has lost 35,000 good jobs in 15 years. In such adversity, the Left Party thrives. Its local membership has quintupled since it began in 2005, to 330. Mr Pietras, spokesman of the Duisburg branch, dreams of 1,000. The local Social Democratic Party (SPD), which ruled the city for 56 years until 2004, has lost half its membership in two decades.
Frighteningly for the SPD, this is a national trend. It has been governing in Berlin, from 1998 to 2005 under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, since then as the junior partner in Angela Merkel's “grand coalition”. But as the Left Party gnaws away at its working-class base, the SPD is starting to panic. The clearest sign is a call by the SPD's boss, Kurt Beck, to extend the period for paying unemployment benefit to older workers. Franz Müntefering, the SPD vice-chancellor under Ms Merkel, has denounced the idea as a “U-turn” from reforms enacted by the Schröder government. The press is speculating that his resignation may be imminent. Mr Beck threatens the foundations of the grand coalition, the Christian Democrats claim.
Why is a small party founded by east German former communists causing national ructions? One reason is that the economic upswing has left so many Germans behind. Unemployment is at its lowest level since the early 1990s, thanks partly to the reforms that Mr Beck now wants to roll back. But many of the new jobs offer lower pay and less security than those lost during the downturn, notes Markus Grabka of DIW, a research institute in Berlin. Relative poverty has jumped, with 17% of Germans earning less than 60% of the median in 2005, up from 12% in 1999. Income-tax cuts have helped the rich; the middle class has shrunk.
On these matters the Left Party is saying what most Germans seem to be thinking. According to one recent poll, 82% of Germans want to lower the retirement age from 67 (reversing another reform), two-thirds want a minimum wage and 72% think the grand coalition should do more to promote social justice. Half want German troops out of Afghanistan, but the Left Party is the only one that unqualifiedly agrees. Unlike the Greens and the Free Democrats, it has no reason to flirt with either party in the grand coalition (the SPD refuses to consider it as a potential partner at federal level). It likes to claim it is Germany's only real opposition party.
This has come about mostly by luck. The Left Party is the third incarnation of East Germany's Socialist Unity Party, which had 2.3m members when the regime collapsed in 1989. It struggled back to life as the Party of Democratic Socialism, trying to be a normal party by catering to Ossis who felt swamped by unification. The Left Party is still strongest in the east: it wins almost a quarter of votes in the six eastern states, has been in a coalition in Mecklenburg-West Pomerania and is now the SPD's partner in the city of Berlin.
It was a bust-up within the SPD that gave the Left Party its purchase in the west. Social Democrats dismayed by Mr Schröder's reforms broke away to form Alternative Labour and Social Justice (WASG), which fought alongside the PDS in the 2005 election. Between them they took almost 9% of the vote. They formally merged into the Left Party in June.
This hybrid works mainly because there is no risk of its assuming national responsibilities anytime soon. It has two leaders: Lothar Bisky, a film-studies professor from Brandenburg (though Gregor Gysi is the party's true eastern star), and Oskar Lafontaine, a firebrand from Saarland given to populist rhetoric, who was once SPD chairman. The SPD loathes Mr Lafontaine for abruptly quitting as Mr Schröder's finance minister in 1999. It has just published “Oskar's World”, a supposedly incriminating compendium of remarks by and about him.
The Left Party's policy documents drip with hostility to capitalism. It leans toward pacifism in foreign policy and against the hawkish European Central Bank. The long-term goal, says Dietmar Bartsch, its general secretary, is “another society” to be achieved by “evolution, not revolution”. Higher taxes and lower defence spending would bring greater equality.
The party's eastern wing has communist remnants (and a libertarian strain, exemplified by Saxony's Julia Bonk, who favours a “right to get high”). But its leaders have been sobered by proximity to power. In the city of Berlin, the Left Party has abetted austerity measures such as pay cuts for public workers that would be deemed heresy in parts of the SPD. Such decisions show that “we are not merely a fair-weather party,” says Harald Wolf, Berlin's economy minister.
Pragmatism is less evident in the former WASG, which is dominated by the politics of protest. Though less inclined to call themselves socialists, the westerners care less about fiscal responsibility. Lacking experience in power, they are unwilling to get it by compromise. André Brie, an eastern moderniser, recently warned westerners (and some easterners) against “black and white thinking” reminiscent of communist times. The Left Party's democratic credentials are often questioned, but Dan Hough says in a new book* that its leaders are all democrats. The main obstacles to co-operation with the SPD in the west are Mr Lafontaine and the stigma of the party's communist past.
The Left Party's short-term aims are thus modest. In most western states its vote is close to the 5% level needed to get into the legislature. It has already cracked Bremen's and could enter up to three more next year. Even in fertile Duisburg, the SPD's shrunken membership still dwarfs that of the Left Party and it dominates the local media, complains Mr Pietras. Hence the immediate ambition, says Mr Bartsch, “to shift the axis of politics to the left.”
The SPD's troubles suggest this may be happening. That does not guarantee the Left Party a bright future. It could be hurt by a more populist SPD, by greater prosperity (incomes have picked up during the revival of the past two years) or by its own internal contradictions. But it could also evolve into a permanent candidate for coalition with the SPD (and perhaps the Greens), including at federal level. The risk then would be of losing what makes it distinctive. But the SPD's panic may not truly subside until the Left Party becomes a potential partner, not a competitor.
* “The Left Party in Contemporary German Politics”, by Dan Hough, Michael Koss and Jonathan Olsen. Palgrave Macmillan, $74.95 and £50
The German left
Troubled times
Oct 11th 2007 | BERLIN AND DUISBURG
From The Economist print edition
Why the rise of the Left Party has cast the Social Democrats into a gloom
Get article background
ASK Ralf Pietras why the Left Party is growing in Duisburg and he offers a ready answer. The coal mines are exhausted, steel is forged by machine and old folk scavenge for bottles to reclaim the deposits. Duisburg, a gritty town at the junction of the Rhine and the Ruhr, has lost 35,000 good jobs in 15 years. In such adversity, the Left Party thrives. Its local membership has quintupled since it began in 2005, to 330. Mr Pietras, spokesman of the Duisburg branch, dreams of 1,000. The local Social Democratic Party (SPD), which ruled the city for 56 years until 2004, has lost half its membership in two decades.
Frighteningly for the SPD, this is a national trend. It has been governing in Berlin, from 1998 to 2005 under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, since then as the junior partner in Angela Merkel's “grand coalition”. But as the Left Party gnaws away at its working-class base, the SPD is starting to panic. The clearest sign is a call by the SPD's boss, Kurt Beck, to extend the period for paying unemployment benefit to older workers. Franz Müntefering, the SPD vice-chancellor under Ms Merkel, has denounced the idea as a “U-turn” from reforms enacted by the Schröder government. The press is speculating that his resignation may be imminent. Mr Beck threatens the foundations of the grand coalition, the Christian Democrats claim.
Why is a small party founded by east German former communists causing national ructions? One reason is that the economic upswing has left so many Germans behind. Unemployment is at its lowest level since the early 1990s, thanks partly to the reforms that Mr Beck now wants to roll back. But many of the new jobs offer lower pay and less security than those lost during the downturn, notes Markus Grabka of DIW, a research institute in Berlin. Relative poverty has jumped, with 17% of Germans earning less than 60% of the median in 2005, up from 12% in 1999. Income-tax cuts have helped the rich; the middle class has shrunk.
On these matters the Left Party is saying what most Germans seem to be thinking. According to one recent poll, 82% of Germans want to lower the retirement age from 67 (reversing another reform), two-thirds want a minimum wage and 72% think the grand coalition should do more to promote social justice. Half want German troops out of Afghanistan, but the Left Party is the only one that unqualifiedly agrees. Unlike the Greens and the Free Democrats, it has no reason to flirt with either party in the grand coalition (the SPD refuses to consider it as a potential partner at federal level). It likes to claim it is Germany's only real opposition party.
This has come about mostly by luck. The Left Party is the third incarnation of East Germany's Socialist Unity Party, which had 2.3m members when the regime collapsed in 1989. It struggled back to life as the Party of Democratic Socialism, trying to be a normal party by catering to Ossis who felt swamped by unification. The Left Party is still strongest in the east: it wins almost a quarter of votes in the six eastern states, has been in a coalition in Mecklenburg-West Pomerania and is now the SPD's partner in the city of Berlin.
It was a bust-up within the SPD that gave the Left Party its purchase in the west. Social Democrats dismayed by Mr Schröder's reforms broke away to form Alternative Labour and Social Justice (WASG), which fought alongside the PDS in the 2005 election. Between them they took almost 9% of the vote. They formally merged into the Left Party in June.
This hybrid works mainly because there is no risk of its assuming national responsibilities anytime soon. It has two leaders: Lothar Bisky, a film-studies professor from Brandenburg (though Gregor Gysi is the party's true eastern star), and Oskar Lafontaine, a firebrand from Saarland given to populist rhetoric, who was once SPD chairman. The SPD loathes Mr Lafontaine for abruptly quitting as Mr Schröder's finance minister in 1999. It has just published “Oskar's World”, a supposedly incriminating compendium of remarks by and about him.
The Left Party's policy documents drip with hostility to capitalism. It leans toward pacifism in foreign policy and against the hawkish European Central Bank. The long-term goal, says Dietmar Bartsch, its general secretary, is “another society” to be achieved by “evolution, not revolution”. Higher taxes and lower defence spending would bring greater equality.
The party's eastern wing has communist remnants (and a libertarian strain, exemplified by Saxony's Julia Bonk, who favours a “right to get high”). But its leaders have been sobered by proximity to power. In the city of Berlin, the Left Party has abetted austerity measures such as pay cuts for public workers that would be deemed heresy in parts of the SPD. Such decisions show that “we are not merely a fair-weather party,” says Harald Wolf, Berlin's economy minister.
Pragmatism is less evident in the former WASG, which is dominated by the politics of protest. Though less inclined to call themselves socialists, the westerners care less about fiscal responsibility. Lacking experience in power, they are unwilling to get it by compromise. André Brie, an eastern moderniser, recently warned westerners (and some easterners) against “black and white thinking” reminiscent of communist times. The Left Party's democratic credentials are often questioned, but Dan Hough says in a new book* that its leaders are all democrats. The main obstacles to co-operation with the SPD in the west are Mr Lafontaine and the stigma of the party's communist past.
The Left Party's short-term aims are thus modest. In most western states its vote is close to the 5% level needed to get into the legislature. It has already cracked Bremen's and could enter up to three more next year. Even in fertile Duisburg, the SPD's shrunken membership still dwarfs that of the Left Party and it dominates the local media, complains Mr Pietras. Hence the immediate ambition, says Mr Bartsch, “to shift the axis of politics to the left.”
The SPD's troubles suggest this may be happening. That does not guarantee the Left Party a bright future. It could be hurt by a more populist SPD, by greater prosperity (incomes have picked up during the revival of the past two years) or by its own internal contradictions. But it could also evolve into a permanent candidate for coalition with the SPD (and perhaps the Greens), including at federal level. The risk then would be of losing what makes it distinctive. But the SPD's panic may not truly subside until the Left Party becomes a potential partner, not a competitor.
* “The Left Party in Contemporary German Politics”, by Dan Hough, Michael Koss and Jonathan Olsen. Palgrave Macmillan, $74.95 and £50
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Sunday, October 07, 2007
Projekt Gutenberg-DE - Kultur - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Projekt Gutenberg-DE - Kultur - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Kurt Tucholsky
Kurzer Abriß der Nationalökonomie
Nationalökonomie ist, wenn die Leute sich wundern, warum sie kein Geld haben. Das hat mehrere Gründe, die feinsten sind die wissenschaftlichen Gründe, doch können solche durch Notverordnungen aufgehoben werden. Über die ältere Nationalökonomie kann man ja nur lachen und dürfen wir selbe daher mit Stillschweigen übergehn. Sie regierte von 715 vor Christo bis zum Jahre 1 nach Marx. Seitdem ist die Frage völlig gelöst: die Leute haben zwar immer noch kein Geld, wissen aber wenigstens, warum.
Kurt Tucholsky
Kurzer Abriß der Nationalökonomie
Nationalökonomie ist, wenn die Leute sich wundern, warum sie kein Geld haben. Das hat mehrere Gründe, die feinsten sind die wissenschaftlichen Gründe, doch können solche durch Notverordnungen aufgehoben werden. Über die ältere Nationalökonomie kann man ja nur lachen und dürfen wir selbe daher mit Stillschweigen übergehn. Sie regierte von 715 vor Christo bis zum Jahre 1 nach Marx. Seitdem ist die Frage völlig gelöst: die Leute haben zwar immer noch kein Geld, wissen aber wenigstens, warum.
FTD.de - Handel + Dienstleister - Nachrichten - Bahn fährt harten Kurs
FTD.de - Handel + Dienstleister - Nachrichten - Bahn fährt harten Kurs
Der Konflikt zwischen Lokführern spitzt sich weiter zu: Die Bahn lehnt Zugeständnisse im Tarifstreit mit der Gewerkschaft GDL strikt ab. Auch die Bundesregierung will sich raushalten. Nun erwägen die Lokführer, künftig ohne Vorwarnung zu streiken.
Der Konflikt zwischen Lokführern spitzt sich weiter zu: Die Bahn lehnt Zugeständnisse im Tarifstreit mit der Gewerkschaft GDL strikt ab. Auch die Bundesregierung will sich raushalten. Nun erwägen die Lokführer, künftig ohne Vorwarnung zu streiken.
Merkel: "Es war ein sehr bewegender Moment für mich" | Welt | Deutsche Welle | 06.10.2007
Merkel: "Es war ein sehr bewegender Moment für mich" | Welt | Deutsche Welle | 06.10.2007
Bundeskanzlerin Angela Merkel hat sich nach ihrem ersten persönlichen Treffen mit dem ehemaligen südafrikanischen Präsidenten Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg sichtlich bewegt gezeigt.
Bundeskanzlerin Angela Merkel hat sich nach ihrem ersten persönlichen Treffen mit dem ehemaligen südafrikanischen Präsidenten Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg sichtlich bewegt gezeigt.
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Barclays gibt Kampf um ABN AMRO auf | Wirtschaft | Deutsche Welle | 05.10.2007
Barclays gibt Kampf um ABN AMRO auf | Wirtschaft | Deutsche Welle | 05.10.2007
Nach einem langen Übernahmekampf hat die britische Großbank Barclays ihr Angebot für den niederländischen Konkurrenten ABN AMRO zurückgezogen. Damit ist der Weg frei für das Konsortium um die Royal Bank of Scotland.
Nach einem langen Übernahmekampf hat die britische Großbank Barclays ihr Angebot für den niederländischen Konkurrenten ABN AMRO zurückgezogen. Damit ist der Weg frei für das Konsortium um die Royal Bank of Scotland.
Friday, October 05, 2007
Ein Chronist deutscher Geschichte | Buch | Deutsche Welle | 05.10.2007
Ein Chronist deutscher Geschichte | Buch | Deutsche Welle | 05.10.2007
Er war einer der beliebtesten und am stärksten verbreiteten deutschen Gegenwartsautoren: der Schriftsteller Walter Kempowski. Er verstarb im Alter von 78 Jahren.
Er war einer der beliebtesten und am stärksten verbreiteten deutschen Gegenwartsautoren: der Schriftsteller Walter Kempowski. Er verstarb im Alter von 78 Jahren.
Thursday, October 04, 2007
Tarifautonomie: Bahn-Streik versetzt Verkehrspolitiker in Alarmstimmung - Wirtschaft - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Tarifautonomie: Bahn-Streik versetzt Verkehrspolitiker in Alarmstimmung - Wirtschaft - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Pendler im Bahn-Chaos, Güterzüge, die ihr Ziel nicht erreichen: Der für Freitag vorgesehene bundesweite Streik der Lokführer schreckt die Verkehrsexperten der Parteien auf. Jetzt mischt sich die Politik in den Arbeitskampf ein - und fordert von den Tarifparteien, endlich Frieden zu schließen.
Pendler im Bahn-Chaos, Güterzüge, die ihr Ziel nicht erreichen: Der für Freitag vorgesehene bundesweite Streik der Lokführer schreckt die Verkehrsexperten der Parteien auf. Jetzt mischt sich die Politik in den Arbeitskampf ein - und fordert von den Tarifparteien, endlich Frieden zu schließen.
Joschka Fischers Buchvorstellung: "Eine Abrechnung sieht anders aus" - Politik - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Joschka Fischers Buchvorstellung: "Eine Abrechnung sieht anders aus" - Politik - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Der selbsternannte letzte Live-Rock'n'Roller der deutschen Politik hat heute sein erstes Soloalbum vorgestellt: Die Memoiren seiner Außenminister-Jahre, Band eins. Joschka Fischer genießt seine neue Rolle als unabhängiger Großkommentator und Elder Statesman.
Der selbsternannte letzte Live-Rock'n'Roller der deutschen Politik hat heute sein erstes Soloalbum vorgestellt: Die Memoiren seiner Außenminister-Jahre, Band eins. Joschka Fischer genießt seine neue Rolle als unabhängiger Großkommentator und Elder Statesman.
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Kurz vor dem Streik: Bahn-Belegschaft schlägt sich auf Seite der Lokführer - Wirtschaft - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Kurz vor dem Streik: Bahn-Belegschaft schlägt sich auf Seite der Lokführer - Wirtschaft - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten
Die Stimmung in der Bahn-Belegschaft kippt: Bisher standen die Lokführer mit ihrer Forderung nach einem eigenen Tarifvertrag ziemlich isoliert da. Doch jetzt solidarisieren sich immer mehr Mitarbeiter mit der Gewerkschaft GDL - aus Ärger über die Konzernleitung.
Die Stimmung in der Bahn-Belegschaft kippt: Bisher standen die Lokführer mit ihrer Forderung nach einem eigenen Tarifvertrag ziemlich isoliert da. Doch jetzt solidarisieren sich immer mehr Mitarbeiter mit der Gewerkschaft GDL - aus Ärger über die Konzernleitung.
FT.com / Companies / Financial services - Deutsche Bank shares rise in spite of losses
FT.com / Companies / Financial services - Deutsche Bank shares rise in spite of losses
Deutsche Bank shares rise in spite of losses
By Chris Hughes and Gillian Tett in London and Ivar Simensen in Frankfurt
Published: October 3 2007 10:08 | Last updated: October 3 2007 10:08
Deutsche Bank on Wednesday became the latest big investment bank to see its shares rise after revealing it had suffered billions of dollars worth of losses in the recent credit turmoil.
In spite of announcing that its investment banking unit would post a third-quarter pre-tax loss of up to €350m, after €2.2bn ($3.1bn) of charges relating to leveraged loans, structured credit products and trading, shares in the German bank closed up 2 per cent as investors welcomed clarification of the extent of its losses.
However, Deutsche also said third-quarter net profits for the group would top €1.4bn, boosted by tax credits. It also reiterated its pre-tax profits target for 2008. However, Jeremy Sigee, analyst at Citi, said the announcement represented a profit warning.
Josef Ackermann, chairman of Deutsche’s management board, said the group saw “substantial opportunities in investment banking after this period of correction”.
The comments were made ahead of an investor conference hosted by Merrill Lynch in London, where Brady Dougan, chief executive of Credit Suisse, echoed Mr Ackermann’s optimism by predicting that his bank could gain market share from rivals once the credit squeeze eased.
Deutsche’s clarification came in the wake of Monday’s profit warnings from rivals Citigroup, UBS and Credit Suisse. These have given investors confidence that the financial cost of the credit crisis is becoming measurable after weeks of uncertainty.
UBS gained 1.4 per cent Wednesday, closing at SFr67.35, while Credit Suisse closed up 1.1 per cent at SFr81.55. US peers including Merrill Lynch and JPMorgan Chase were also up in early trading.
The global sector is up 2.5 per cent this week.
The rally continued against a backdrop of continued weak sentiment in the money markets, in spite of the vast volume of liquidity that central banks have pumped into the system in recent weeks.
Huw van Steenis, analyst at Morgan Stanley, said the banks’ disclosure, coupled with expectations of rate cuts, was attracting long-only investors to increase their exposure to banks. This was forcing hedge funds to close short positions.
“The market views the writedowns at the investment banks cathartically,” he said. “UBS’s profit warning was an inflection point for European banks.”
Robert Law, banks analyst at Lehman Brothers, said: “The capital market banks have taken marks on their exposure and that builds confidence.
“One of the biggest issues with the sector has been that people haven’t really known where these exposures are, and how much they are.”
But others questioned the market’s newfound confidence.
Steve Russell, investment director at Ruffer, the London-based asset manager, said: “The worse the news is, the more the market goes up. As uncertainty is reduced, it should make sense to attempt some bottom-fishing – but we think it is far too early to do so.
“The real issue is that a whole area of [capital markets] banking business is now closed off for a long time. There’s a big elephant of a credit crunch around the corner and we haven’t seen anyone adjust their earnings forecasts for that.”
Crispin Odey, founder of Odey Asset Management, the London-based hedge fund, said hedge funds that had bet that banks’ shares would continue to fall were having a ”really painful” week. “Everyone involved in the interbank market can’t believe how strong the equity markets are,” he said.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Deutsche Bank shares rise in spite of losses
By Chris Hughes and Gillian Tett in London and Ivar Simensen in Frankfurt
Published: October 3 2007 10:08 | Last updated: October 3 2007 10:08
Deutsche Bank on Wednesday became the latest big investment bank to see its shares rise after revealing it had suffered billions of dollars worth of losses in the recent credit turmoil.
In spite of announcing that its investment banking unit would post a third-quarter pre-tax loss of up to €350m, after €2.2bn ($3.1bn) of charges relating to leveraged loans, structured credit products and trading, shares in the German bank closed up 2 per cent as investors welcomed clarification of the extent of its losses.
However, Deutsche also said third-quarter net profits for the group would top €1.4bn, boosted by tax credits. It also reiterated its pre-tax profits target for 2008. However, Jeremy Sigee, analyst at Citi, said the announcement represented a profit warning.
Josef Ackermann, chairman of Deutsche’s management board, said the group saw “substantial opportunities in investment banking after this period of correction”.
The comments were made ahead of an investor conference hosted by Merrill Lynch in London, where Brady Dougan, chief executive of Credit Suisse, echoed Mr Ackermann’s optimism by predicting that his bank could gain market share from rivals once the credit squeeze eased.
Deutsche’s clarification came in the wake of Monday’s profit warnings from rivals Citigroup, UBS and Credit Suisse. These have given investors confidence that the financial cost of the credit crisis is becoming measurable after weeks of uncertainty.
UBS gained 1.4 per cent Wednesday, closing at SFr67.35, while Credit Suisse closed up 1.1 per cent at SFr81.55. US peers including Merrill Lynch and JPMorgan Chase were also up in early trading.
The global sector is up 2.5 per cent this week.
The rally continued against a backdrop of continued weak sentiment in the money markets, in spite of the vast volume of liquidity that central banks have pumped into the system in recent weeks.
Huw van Steenis, analyst at Morgan Stanley, said the banks’ disclosure, coupled with expectations of rate cuts, was attracting long-only investors to increase their exposure to banks. This was forcing hedge funds to close short positions.
“The market views the writedowns at the investment banks cathartically,” he said. “UBS’s profit warning was an inflection point for European banks.”
Robert Law, banks analyst at Lehman Brothers, said: “The capital market banks have taken marks on their exposure and that builds confidence.
“One of the biggest issues with the sector has been that people haven’t really known where these exposures are, and how much they are.”
But others questioned the market’s newfound confidence.
Steve Russell, investment director at Ruffer, the London-based asset manager, said: “The worse the news is, the more the market goes up. As uncertainty is reduced, it should make sense to attempt some bottom-fishing – but we think it is far too early to do so.
“The real issue is that a whole area of [capital markets] banking business is now closed off for a long time. There’s a big elephant of a credit crunch around the corner and we haven’t seen anyone adjust their earnings forecasts for that.”
Crispin Odey, founder of Odey Asset Management, the London-based hedge fund, said hedge funds that had bet that banks’ shares would continue to fall were having a ”really painful” week. “Everyone involved in the interbank market can’t believe how strong the equity markets are,” he said.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Monday, October 01, 2007
FT.com / Home UK / UK - End of an era in Germany as Stoiber steps aside
FT.com / Home UK / UK - End of an era in Germany as Stoiber steps aside
End of an era in Germany as Stoiber steps aside
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: October 1 2007 03:00 | Last updated: October 1 2007 03:00
An era in German politics ended at the weekend when Edmund Stoiber exited national politics, leaving the future of wealthy Bavaria in the hands of the country's toughest law-and-order -politician.
Mr Stoiber, premier of the southern German state since 1993, was central in building one of Europe's most powerful regional economies, attracting thousands of hi-tech, engineering and media companies and reducing unemployment to half the national average.
Delegates from his Christian Social Union gave him a warm send-off at a weekend congress in Munich even though his departure - first announced in January - was tinged with anger. He was forced to step down earlier than planned after mishandling a scandal and alienating many CSU members.
The 66-year old urged the party to remain the "flag-bearer" in Germany of conservative, pro-family values.
Mr Stoiber - who in national elections in 2002 came within 6,000 votes of toppling former chancellor Gerhard Schröder - is due to take up an unpaid post heading European Union efforts to cut red tape.
He will be replaced as premier by Günther Beckstein, Bavarian interior minister since 1993, who is well known for his regular calls for tougher security laws and tighter controls on -foreigners.
Mr Stoiber handed leadership of the CSU to Erwin Huber, the Bavarian economics minister, who won a rare election run-off for the post, fending off bids from Horst Seehofer, national farming minister, and Gabriele Pauli, whose anti-Stoiber campaign in January triggered his exit.
A smooth political transition in Bavaria is crucial for Angela Merkel, German chancellor, and her Christian Democrats - the CSU's larger sister party - if she is to win re-election in 2009. The CSU regularly gains more than 50 per cent of votes in Bavaria, compared with 30-40 per cent for the CDU, but support dipped this year after the turmoil over Mr Stoiber's departure.
The chancellor praised Mr Stoiber at the CSU congress, but will be relieved that one of her most powerful political irritants has stepped aside.
Mr Beckstein - due to be elected premier on October 9 - promised "continuity" with Mr Stoiber's mix of liberal economic policy and arch-conservative social values.
In the short term any changes will be more in style than substance. Despite his tough image Mr Beckstein has a more genial, inclusive approach than the austere Mr Stoiber, who lacks Bavaria's famous joviality. Mr Huber, a former tax inspector seen as competent but uncharismatic, promised to retain the CSU's absolute majority, in place since 1962, in state elections next year.
In the longer term the two men - rivals until a few months ago - may struggle to maintain Mr Stoiber's impressive record. His decisions in recent years to sell off most of the state's assets and introduce long-term austerity measures leave them with only limited room for manoeuvre. Mr Stoiber's pledge, only days before stepping down, that Bavaria would help build a high-tech rail link from Munich airport to the centre of the regional capital could also prove costly.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
End of an era in Germany as Stoiber steps aside
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: October 1 2007 03:00 | Last updated: October 1 2007 03:00
An era in German politics ended at the weekend when Edmund Stoiber exited national politics, leaving the future of wealthy Bavaria in the hands of the country's toughest law-and-order -politician.
Mr Stoiber, premier of the southern German state since 1993, was central in building one of Europe's most powerful regional economies, attracting thousands of hi-tech, engineering and media companies and reducing unemployment to half the national average.
Delegates from his Christian Social Union gave him a warm send-off at a weekend congress in Munich even though his departure - first announced in January - was tinged with anger. He was forced to step down earlier than planned after mishandling a scandal and alienating many CSU members.
The 66-year old urged the party to remain the "flag-bearer" in Germany of conservative, pro-family values.
Mr Stoiber - who in national elections in 2002 came within 6,000 votes of toppling former chancellor Gerhard Schröder - is due to take up an unpaid post heading European Union efforts to cut red tape.
He will be replaced as premier by Günther Beckstein, Bavarian interior minister since 1993, who is well known for his regular calls for tougher security laws and tighter controls on -foreigners.
Mr Stoiber handed leadership of the CSU to Erwin Huber, the Bavarian economics minister, who won a rare election run-off for the post, fending off bids from Horst Seehofer, national farming minister, and Gabriele Pauli, whose anti-Stoiber campaign in January triggered his exit.
A smooth political transition in Bavaria is crucial for Angela Merkel, German chancellor, and her Christian Democrats - the CSU's larger sister party - if she is to win re-election in 2009. The CSU regularly gains more than 50 per cent of votes in Bavaria, compared with 30-40 per cent for the CDU, but support dipped this year after the turmoil over Mr Stoiber's departure.
The chancellor praised Mr Stoiber at the CSU congress, but will be relieved that one of her most powerful political irritants has stepped aside.
Mr Beckstein - due to be elected premier on October 9 - promised "continuity" with Mr Stoiber's mix of liberal economic policy and arch-conservative social values.
In the short term any changes will be more in style than substance. Despite his tough image Mr Beckstein has a more genial, inclusive approach than the austere Mr Stoiber, who lacks Bavaria's famous joviality. Mr Huber, a former tax inspector seen as competent but uncharismatic, promised to retain the CSU's absolute majority, in place since 1962, in state elections next year.
In the longer term the two men - rivals until a few months ago - may struggle to maintain Mr Stoiber's impressive record. His decisions in recent years to sell off most of the state's assets and introduce long-term austerity measures leave them with only limited room for manoeuvre. Mr Stoiber's pledge, only days before stepping down, that Bavaria would help build a high-tech rail link from Munich airport to the centre of the regional capital could also prove costly.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
FTD.de - Finanzdienstleister - Nachrichten - Experte rechnet mit Milliarden-Abschreibung bei Merrill Lynch
FTD.de - Finanzdienstleister - Nachrichten - Experte rechnet mit Milliarden-Abschreibung bei Merrill Lynch
Der US-Investmentbank Merrill Lynch droht nach Ansicht eines Analysten von Goldman Sachs im dritten Quartal ein Verlust im Anleihegeschäft in Höhe von 1,5 Mrd. $. Schuld daran ist auch die Subprime-Krise.
Der US-Investmentbank Merrill Lynch droht nach Ansicht eines Analysten von Goldman Sachs im dritten Quartal ein Verlust im Anleihegeschäft in Höhe von 1,5 Mrd. $. Schuld daran ist auch die Subprime-Krise.
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Was in Deutschland teurer wird
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Was in Deutschland teurer wird
Nicht nur die niedrigen Nettolöhne schränken den finanziellen Spielraum vieler Bundesbürger ein. Die Ausgaben des täglichen Lebens steigen derzeit deutlich. Das gilt nicht nur fürs Einkaufen und Bahnfahren.
Nicht nur die niedrigen Nettolöhne schränken den finanziellen Spielraum vieler Bundesbürger ein. Die Ausgaben des täglichen Lebens steigen derzeit deutlich. Das gilt nicht nur fürs Einkaufen und Bahnfahren.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
FT.com / Companies / Europe - Berlin takes slow train
FT.com / Companies / Europe - Berlin takes slow train
Berlin takes slow train
By Paul Betts
Published: September 26 2007 03:00 | Last updated: September 26 2007 03:00
Deutsche Bahn set off towards privatisation a decade or so ago. It has been a long and tiring journey. But this summer it looked as if the German railway was reaching its destination when the cabinet approved the bill to sell off up to 49 per cent of the state company.
Yet like autumn leaves on the lines, politicians from left and right are creating obstructions that risk derailing the process.
Parliament has started debating the bill partially to privatise the train operator and giving it the right to operate the rail network, but the final vote will only take place next year.
Some socialist members of Angela Merkel's grand coalition are raising objections to the partial sale to institutional investors. They are suggesting that if the sale does take place it should be directed entirely to small German shareholders. They would be granted non-voting shares paying a hefty coupon. This would keep the railway firmly in state hands.
Some members of Ms Merkel's rightwing CDU party are rallying behind their leftwing coalition partners, for reasons of their own. They are not so much opposed to the partial sale, but do not like the idea of privatising the train operator as well as the rail network. The problem is that splitting the operator and the network, which would remain wholly state-owned, would make any sale difficult, given that what attracts international funds and infrastructure companies is the idea of investing in an integrated railway group.
A number of regions have joined the debate, making it clear they do not like the sell-off and will do all they can to block it.
Ms Merkel has so far remained on the fence. But she can hardly keep quiet over such an important policy decision designed to show Germany's free-market credentials. Allowing the politicians, after all these years, to sabotage this partial privatisation would send an uncomfortable signal to the international investment community and Germany's European partners.
It would make other future privatisations - the government's remaining 32 per cent in Deutsche Telekom, its 30 per cent stake in the post office, airports, eventually even motorways - more complicated. Worse, it would highlight the country's continued protectionist instincts and doubtless undermine Ms Merkel's own position.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Berlin takes slow train
By Paul Betts
Published: September 26 2007 03:00 | Last updated: September 26 2007 03:00
Deutsche Bahn set off towards privatisation a decade or so ago. It has been a long and tiring journey. But this summer it looked as if the German railway was reaching its destination when the cabinet approved the bill to sell off up to 49 per cent of the state company.
Yet like autumn leaves on the lines, politicians from left and right are creating obstructions that risk derailing the process.
Parliament has started debating the bill partially to privatise the train operator and giving it the right to operate the rail network, but the final vote will only take place next year.
Some socialist members of Angela Merkel's grand coalition are raising objections to the partial sale to institutional investors. They are suggesting that if the sale does take place it should be directed entirely to small German shareholders. They would be granted non-voting shares paying a hefty coupon. This would keep the railway firmly in state hands.
Some members of Ms Merkel's rightwing CDU party are rallying behind their leftwing coalition partners, for reasons of their own. They are not so much opposed to the partial sale, but do not like the idea of privatising the train operator as well as the rail network. The problem is that splitting the operator and the network, which would remain wholly state-owned, would make any sale difficult, given that what attracts international funds and infrastructure companies is the idea of investing in an integrated railway group.
A number of regions have joined the debate, making it clear they do not like the sell-off and will do all they can to block it.
Ms Merkel has so far remained on the fence. But she can hardly keep quiet over such an important policy decision designed to show Germany's free-market credentials. Allowing the politicians, after all these years, to sabotage this partial privatisation would send an uncomfortable signal to the international investment community and Germany's European partners.
It would make other future privatisations - the government's remaining 32 per cent in Deutsche Telekom, its 30 per cent stake in the post office, airports, eventually even motorways - more complicated. Worse, it would highlight the country's continued protectionist instincts and doubtless undermine Ms Merkel's own position.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Thursday, September 20, 2007
The Weimar Republic | The best and the worst | Economist.com
The Weimar Republic | The best and the worst | Economist.com
The Weimar Republic
The best and the worst
Sep 20th 2007
From The Economist print edition
Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy
By Eric D. Weitz
Princeton University Press; 448 pages; $29.95 and £17.95
Buy it at
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
NEARLY a century has passed but the Janus face of the Weimar Republic appals and attracts as much as ever. On the one side, hyperinflation, mass unemployment and political assassination; on the other, dazzling creativity in the arts and sciences—not to mention myriad forms of nightlife to suit every taste, however odd. It was indeed, as Dickens said of the French revolution, the best of times and the worst of times, the spring of hope and the winter of despair.
Did Germany's convulsive experiment with democracy between 1919 and 1933 ever stand a real chance? One might well think not. Born in chaos after the slaughter of a war lost through what many Germans wrongly construed as a “stab in the back”, the fledgling republic was hamstrung from the start. It concocted a “perfect” constitution that gave as much scope to its foes as to its friends, and it was saddled by vengeful victors with reparations demands that were all but impossible to meet. Towards the end of the republic's life, one-third of the labour force was jobless. When Hitler's matchless ability to tap resentment and hatred is added to this poisonous mix, Weimar's plunge into dictatorship looks to have been inevitable.
Or was it? The real wonder is not that Weimar failed but that it lasted as long as it did—longer, after all, than the 12 years of Hitler's “1,000-year Reich”. For a while, from 1924 when the currency was stabilised (or rather re-invented) and the economy recovered, it even seemed to be succeeding against all the odds. In the 1928 general election, extremists of left and right were trounced and the Nazis in particular were close to despair—until, that is, the Wall Street crash and subsequent depression gave them a new, finally decisive boost. Through all these peaks and troughs, writers and artists and composers and the rest, as though rightly aware time was not on their side, flung out one formidable modern classic after another.
The literature on Weimar is immense, but we could well do with a single, authoritative, jargon-free volume that pulls all the strands together. Eric Weitz, a professor at the University of Minnesota, has made a valiant stab at producing one, but he does not quite succeed. He is a reliable guide through Weimar's political and economic maze, and a good one on the social revolution that made many women (far from all) less dependent on husband, hearth and home. In one of his best chapters, Mr Weitz takes us on a ramble through the sleepless metropolis of 1920s Berlin: from the glittering cafés around Potsdamer Platz to Isherwood's cabarets and seedy bars, from the bracing beaches of Wannsee Lake to the dank and stifling dwellings of the workers' quarter, Wedding.
The author's touch is less sure when he turns to literature and music. Naturally Mr Weitz had to be selective: but does it, for instance, make sense to devote six pages alone to Thomas Mann's “Der Zauberberg” and next to nothing to the bitterly satirical work of Thomas's elder brother Heinrich, who better saw where Weimar was stumbling? No quarrels with the choice of the Brecht/Weill “Die Dreigroschenoper” as a Weimar work par excellence; but there is next to nothing on Schönberg (who spent 1925-33 in Berlin) nor on Berg or Krenek, nor on the Kroll Opera House, which under Klemperer and Zemlinsky presented Weimar's—perhaps the world's—most daring repertoire and stagings. Nor will fans of the peerless Berlin Philharmonic easily forgive Mr Weitz for identifying their orchestra as the (more lowly) Berlin Symphony.
More seriously, Mr Weitz's account badly lacks a context. We learn much about the (astonishing) development of social security under Weimar, about seething anti-Semitism and diplomatic blunders. What we lack is a scene-setting chapter explaining the background to all these things. Nor is enough sketched about life in other great European cities to explain what made Weimar unique. Were women less liberated in London, were artists less bold in Paris? Why was the political left bitterly split in Germany but not in Austria, which had lost not just a war but an empire?
Whatever the flaws, this remains an often gripping (and splendidly illustrated) work from which two main lessons can be drawn. One is how quickly democracy can slip away. In 1928 the Nazis won just 2.6% of the vote; five years later Hitler was in power. The other, which Mr Weitz rams home in his last pages, is how often democracy is under most threat not from enemies abroad but from those who use its institutions and claim to speak in its name. These lessons are hardly new. But they are well worth stressing at a time when, in the name of the fight against international terrorism, individual liberties in democratic societies are being steadily curtailed.
Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy
By Eric D. Weitz
Princeton University Press; 448 pages; $29.95 and £17.95
The Weimar Republic
The best and the worst
Sep 20th 2007
From The Economist print edition
Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy
By Eric D. Weitz
Princeton University Press; 448 pages; $29.95 and £17.95
Buy it at
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
NEARLY a century has passed but the Janus face of the Weimar Republic appals and attracts as much as ever. On the one side, hyperinflation, mass unemployment and political assassination; on the other, dazzling creativity in the arts and sciences—not to mention myriad forms of nightlife to suit every taste, however odd. It was indeed, as Dickens said of the French revolution, the best of times and the worst of times, the spring of hope and the winter of despair.
Did Germany's convulsive experiment with democracy between 1919 and 1933 ever stand a real chance? One might well think not. Born in chaos after the slaughter of a war lost through what many Germans wrongly construed as a “stab in the back”, the fledgling republic was hamstrung from the start. It concocted a “perfect” constitution that gave as much scope to its foes as to its friends, and it was saddled by vengeful victors with reparations demands that were all but impossible to meet. Towards the end of the republic's life, one-third of the labour force was jobless. When Hitler's matchless ability to tap resentment and hatred is added to this poisonous mix, Weimar's plunge into dictatorship looks to have been inevitable.
Or was it? The real wonder is not that Weimar failed but that it lasted as long as it did—longer, after all, than the 12 years of Hitler's “1,000-year Reich”. For a while, from 1924 when the currency was stabilised (or rather re-invented) and the economy recovered, it even seemed to be succeeding against all the odds. In the 1928 general election, extremists of left and right were trounced and the Nazis in particular were close to despair—until, that is, the Wall Street crash and subsequent depression gave them a new, finally decisive boost. Through all these peaks and troughs, writers and artists and composers and the rest, as though rightly aware time was not on their side, flung out one formidable modern classic after another.
The literature on Weimar is immense, but we could well do with a single, authoritative, jargon-free volume that pulls all the strands together. Eric Weitz, a professor at the University of Minnesota, has made a valiant stab at producing one, but he does not quite succeed. He is a reliable guide through Weimar's political and economic maze, and a good one on the social revolution that made many women (far from all) less dependent on husband, hearth and home. In one of his best chapters, Mr Weitz takes us on a ramble through the sleepless metropolis of 1920s Berlin: from the glittering cafés around Potsdamer Platz to Isherwood's cabarets and seedy bars, from the bracing beaches of Wannsee Lake to the dank and stifling dwellings of the workers' quarter, Wedding.
The author's touch is less sure when he turns to literature and music. Naturally Mr Weitz had to be selective: but does it, for instance, make sense to devote six pages alone to Thomas Mann's “Der Zauberberg” and next to nothing to the bitterly satirical work of Thomas's elder brother Heinrich, who better saw where Weimar was stumbling? No quarrels with the choice of the Brecht/Weill “Die Dreigroschenoper” as a Weimar work par excellence; but there is next to nothing on Schönberg (who spent 1925-33 in Berlin) nor on Berg or Krenek, nor on the Kroll Opera House, which under Klemperer and Zemlinsky presented Weimar's—perhaps the world's—most daring repertoire and stagings. Nor will fans of the peerless Berlin Philharmonic easily forgive Mr Weitz for identifying their orchestra as the (more lowly) Berlin Symphony.
More seriously, Mr Weitz's account badly lacks a context. We learn much about the (astonishing) development of social security under Weimar, about seething anti-Semitism and diplomatic blunders. What we lack is a scene-setting chapter explaining the background to all these things. Nor is enough sketched about life in other great European cities to explain what made Weimar unique. Were women less liberated in London, were artists less bold in Paris? Why was the political left bitterly split in Germany but not in Austria, which had lost not just a war but an empire?
Whatever the flaws, this remains an often gripping (and splendidly illustrated) work from which two main lessons can be drawn. One is how quickly democracy can slip away. In 1928 the Nazis won just 2.6% of the vote; five years later Hitler was in power. The other, which Mr Weitz rams home in his last pages, is how often democracy is under most threat not from enemies abroad but from those who use its institutions and claim to speak in its name. These lessons are hardly new. But they are well worth stressing at a time when, in the name of the fight against international terrorism, individual liberties in democratic societies are being steadily curtailed.
Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy
By Eric D. Weitz
Princeton University Press; 448 pages; $29.95 and £17.95
Monday, September 17, 2007
FT.com / Companies / US & Canada - Deutsche Telekom in $1.6bn US buy
FT.com / Companies / US & Canada - Deutsche Telekom in $1.6bn US buy
Deutsche Telekom in $1.6bn US buy
By Reuters, September 17
Deutsche Telekom’s mobile phone division T-Mobile USA has agreed to buy SunCom Wireless Holdings for about $1.6bn, the companies said on Monday.
Deutsche Telekom said in a statement it would also take on SunCom debt of almost $800m and it saw synergies from the transaction of about $1bn.
SunCom shareholders will receive $27 a share, a 22.7 per cent premium to Friday’s closing price, the companies said.
The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2008.
SunCom, founded in 1999, operates in the south-eastern US and in the Caribbean. It had more than 1.1m customers by the end of June and posted first-half revenue of $242.5m.
The acquisition will further enhance T-Mobile’s network coverage through the addition of SunCom’s markets and customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, Deutsche Telekom said.
”With the acquisition of SunCom, we will continue to implement our strategy to `grow abroad with mobile’, which is part of our overall group strategy,” said Rene Obermann, chief executive.
Mr Obermann said in March he would pursue acquisitions in the mobile phone sector, which is expected to see continued growth.
Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest operator measured by sales, last month won permission from the European Commission for its T-Mobile Netherlands unit to buy the Dutch unit of rival France Telecom’s Orange division.
© Reuters Limited Click for restrictions
Deutsche Telekom in $1.6bn US buy
By Reuters, September 17
Deutsche Telekom’s mobile phone division T-Mobile USA has agreed to buy SunCom Wireless Holdings for about $1.6bn, the companies said on Monday.
Deutsche Telekom said in a statement it would also take on SunCom debt of almost $800m and it saw synergies from the transaction of about $1bn.
SunCom shareholders will receive $27 a share, a 22.7 per cent premium to Friday’s closing price, the companies said.
The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2008.
SunCom, founded in 1999, operates in the south-eastern US and in the Caribbean. It had more than 1.1m customers by the end of June and posted first-half revenue of $242.5m.
The acquisition will further enhance T-Mobile’s network coverage through the addition of SunCom’s markets and customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, Deutsche Telekom said.
”With the acquisition of SunCom, we will continue to implement our strategy to `grow abroad with mobile’, which is part of our overall group strategy,” said Rene Obermann, chief executive.
Mr Obermann said in March he would pursue acquisitions in the mobile phone sector, which is expected to see continued growth.
Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest operator measured by sales, last month won permission from the European Commission for its T-Mobile Netherlands unit to buy the Dutch unit of rival France Telecom’s Orange division.
© Reuters Limited Click for restrictions
FT.com / Companies / Telecoms - Deutsche Telekom buys US operator
FT.com / Companies / Telecoms - Deutsche Telekom buys US operator
Deutsche Telekom buys US operator
By Gerrit Wiesmann in Frankfurt
Published: September 17 2007 20:54 | Last updated: September 17 2007 20:54
Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest telephone group, underlined its determination to do business in the US on Monday by paying $2.4bn for SunCom Wireless, a mobile phone operator in south-east US.
In the spring, René Obermann, DT chief executive, pledged to expand DT’s T-Mobile in existing markets, including the US, in response to falling sales in its domestic fixed-line business.
In June, DT agreed to buy France Telecom’s Dutch mobile unit for €1.3bn ($1.8bn), a move pending approval from Orange Netherlands’ works council.
The Bonn-based company has been shaken by client flight in Germany as customers ditch old-style phone connections for broadband and mobile phones – services DT rivals have been able to offer far more cheaply.
DT’s two largest shareholders, the German government with 32 per cent and Blackstone private equity with 5 per cent, in November installed Mr Obermann to push through cost cuts and shepherd growth abroad.
In the acquisition of SunCom, T-Mobile USA will pay $1.6bn in cash and assume $800m in debt in order to boost its client base by 1.1m to more than 28m. This represents about one quarter of T-Mobile’s 113m-plus customers worldwide.
Instead of relying on roaming agreements, T-Mobile will now be able to serve directly customers in four south-eastern states, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands – and so gain access to 98 of the top 100 markets in the country.
However, this will do little to close the gap on T-Mobile’s three larger US rivals, AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel, which have been buying regional US service providers. AT&T has 61m customers, more than twice the number that T-Mobile USA will have after this deal.
Mr Obermann has said that the US can stomach a fourth player, especially one stressing service rather than size. “This acquisition will fit perfectly with our strategy to grow abroad with mobile,” he said in a statement.
DT agreed to pay SunCom investors $27 per share, 23 per cent more than the stock’s closing price on Friday. The US company’s share price leapt 17 per cent at the start of US trading to settle at about $26 level in mid-morning trade on Monday. DT’s share price was flat at €13.70.
DT took a close look at Telecom Italia’s mobile unit TIM when it almost went on sale last year – but Mr Obermann has stressed DT’s current focus on curing its domestic ills.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Deutsche Telekom buys US operator
By Gerrit Wiesmann in Frankfurt
Published: September 17 2007 20:54 | Last updated: September 17 2007 20:54
Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest telephone group, underlined its determination to do business in the US on Monday by paying $2.4bn for SunCom Wireless, a mobile phone operator in south-east US.
In the spring, René Obermann, DT chief executive, pledged to expand DT’s T-Mobile in existing markets, including the US, in response to falling sales in its domestic fixed-line business.
In June, DT agreed to buy France Telecom’s Dutch mobile unit for €1.3bn ($1.8bn), a move pending approval from Orange Netherlands’ works council.
The Bonn-based company has been shaken by client flight in Germany as customers ditch old-style phone connections for broadband and mobile phones – services DT rivals have been able to offer far more cheaply.
DT’s two largest shareholders, the German government with 32 per cent and Blackstone private equity with 5 per cent, in November installed Mr Obermann to push through cost cuts and shepherd growth abroad.
In the acquisition of SunCom, T-Mobile USA will pay $1.6bn in cash and assume $800m in debt in order to boost its client base by 1.1m to more than 28m. This represents about one quarter of T-Mobile’s 113m-plus customers worldwide.
Instead of relying on roaming agreements, T-Mobile will now be able to serve directly customers in four south-eastern states, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands – and so gain access to 98 of the top 100 markets in the country.
However, this will do little to close the gap on T-Mobile’s three larger US rivals, AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel, which have been buying regional US service providers. AT&T has 61m customers, more than twice the number that T-Mobile USA will have after this deal.
Mr Obermann has said that the US can stomach a fourth player, especially one stressing service rather than size. “This acquisition will fit perfectly with our strategy to grow abroad with mobile,” he said in a statement.
DT agreed to pay SunCom investors $27 per share, 23 per cent more than the stock’s closing price on Friday. The US company’s share price leapt 17 per cent at the start of US trading to settle at about $26 level in mid-morning trade on Monday. DT’s share price was flat at €13.70.
DT took a close look at Telecom Italia’s mobile unit TIM when it almost went on sale last year – but Mr Obermann has stressed DT’s current focus on curing its domestic ills.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Schlappe für Parteiführung der Grünen | Kommentar | Deutsche Welle | 16.09.2007
Schlappe für Parteiführung der Grünen | Kommentar | Deutsche Welle | 16.09.2007
Beim Sonderparteitag der Grünen zum Bundeswehr-Einsatz in Afghanistan gab's eine herbe Niederlage für den Bundesvorstand. Dafür werden die Grünen einen hohen Preis zahlen - meint Nina Werkhäuser.
Beim Sonderparteitag der Grünen zum Bundeswehr-Einsatz in Afghanistan gab's eine herbe Niederlage für den Bundesvorstand. Dafür werden die Grünen einen hohen Preis zahlen - meint Nina Werkhäuser.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Debatte im Reichstag Breitseite von Links - Deutschland - sueddeutsche.de
Debatte im Reichstag Breitseite von Links - Deutschland - sueddeutsche.de
Mit sehr unterschiedlichen Wortbeiträgen haben die Oppositionsparteien die ersten beiden Regierungsjahre der Großen Koalition bedacht. Während die Linke die Politik der Kanzlerin harsch attackierte, formulierten FDP und Grüne geradezu handzahm - und sprachen in einem Punkt sogar ein Lob aus.
Mit sehr unterschiedlichen Wortbeiträgen haben die Oppositionsparteien die ersten beiden Regierungsjahre der Großen Koalition bedacht. Während die Linke die Politik der Kanzlerin harsch attackierte, formulierten FDP und Grüne geradezu handzahm - und sprachen in einem Punkt sogar ein Lob aus.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
FT.com / Companies / Europe - State players
FT.com / Companies / Europe - State players
State players
By Paul Betts
Published: September 12 2007 03:00 | Last updated: September 12 2007 03:00
Germany's Angela Merkel and France's Nicolas Sarkozy got together again this week to renew their concerns over the current hidden risks in the financial markets.
They are lobbying other leading industrialised countries for the establishment of new rules to increase the transparency of financial markets, especially the new breed of investors such as hedge funds and private equity.
The German chancellor is also very worried by the emergence of government investment institutions: so-called sovereign funds. Oil-rich countries, and others such as Singapore and China, are increasingly taking the profits from their fast-developing economies and putting them to work in the markets.
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority alone has some $875bn of international assets in its portfolio while Norway with its $300bn sovereign fund has emerged as the second-largest investor in France's CAC40 index of blue-chip companies.
Ms Merkel worries that such governments could become, if they are not already, significant owners of German wealth- providing companies. She may have a point.
Although these sovereign funds have so far been fairly passive investors - their purpose being to diversify and increase their nation's oil wealth - there is always the risk that they may at some stage adopt a more activist approach. Then the question will be whether their activism will be in the interest of wider shareholder value or used to advance their own specific geopolitical and economic goals.
That said, at least in the case of Norway, it seems the interest of the Scandinavian country lies primarily in long-term value creation. The pressing need is to finance the state pension fund commitments to an ageing population.
This should be encouraging for the markets, especially in their current febrile state. But equally it should not be an excuse to bury the need for improved disclosure from these fast-growing sovereign investment funds and other market players.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
State players
By Paul Betts
Published: September 12 2007 03:00 | Last updated: September 12 2007 03:00
Germany's Angela Merkel and France's Nicolas Sarkozy got together again this week to renew their concerns over the current hidden risks in the financial markets.
They are lobbying other leading industrialised countries for the establishment of new rules to increase the transparency of financial markets, especially the new breed of investors such as hedge funds and private equity.
The German chancellor is also very worried by the emergence of government investment institutions: so-called sovereign funds. Oil-rich countries, and others such as Singapore and China, are increasingly taking the profits from their fast-developing economies and putting them to work in the markets.
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority alone has some $875bn of international assets in its portfolio while Norway with its $300bn sovereign fund has emerged as the second-largest investor in France's CAC40 index of blue-chip companies.
Ms Merkel worries that such governments could become, if they are not already, significant owners of German wealth- providing companies. She may have a point.
Although these sovereign funds have so far been fairly passive investors - their purpose being to diversify and increase their nation's oil wealth - there is always the risk that they may at some stage adopt a more activist approach. Then the question will be whether their activism will be in the interest of wider shareholder value or used to advance their own specific geopolitical and economic goals.
That said, at least in the case of Norway, it seems the interest of the Scandinavian country lies primarily in long-term value creation. The pressing need is to finance the state pension fund commitments to an ageing population.
This should be encouraging for the markets, especially in their current febrile state. But equally it should not be an excuse to bury the need for improved disclosure from these fast-growing sovereign investment funds and other market players.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Medien - Feuilleton - FAZ.NET - Alexander Kluge: Die Stimme des neuen deutschen Films
Medien - Feuilleton - FAZ.NET - Alexander Kluge: Die Stimme des neuen deutschen Films
Fast drei Jahrzehnten lang war Alexander Kluge eine der wichtigsten Stimmen des neuen deutschen Films, gerade so lange, wie es diesen gab. Seit 1988 arbeitet er weitgehend fürs Fernsehen und schreibt natürlich - Literatur, Essayistisches, Kulturtheoretisches, was dann wieder in Fragmenten in seinen Fernsehfilmen wiederkehrt. So hat er immer gearbeitet - mehrfach verwertet, was ihn interessierte, in verschiedenenen Medien bearbeitet, was er einmal gefunden oder formuliert hatte.
Fast drei Jahrzehnten lang war Alexander Kluge eine der wichtigsten Stimmen des neuen deutschen Films, gerade so lange, wie es diesen gab. Seit 1988 arbeitet er weitgehend fürs Fernsehen und schreibt natürlich - Literatur, Essayistisches, Kulturtheoretisches, was dann wieder in Fragmenten in seinen Fernsehfilmen wiederkehrt. So hat er immer gearbeitet - mehrfach verwertet, was ihn interessierte, in verschiedenenen Medien bearbeitet, was er einmal gefunden oder formuliert hatte.
FT.com / Reports - Germany relies on ‘Vorsprung durch Technik’
FT.com / Reports - Germany relies on ‘Vorsprung durch Technik’
Germany relies on ‘Vorsprung durch Technik’
By Richard Milne
Published: September 11 2007 08:13 | Last updated: September 11 2007 08:13
Every news article about Germany boils down, according to journalistic wisdom, to one question: is the country changing or not? Viewed through this lens, what is taking place in Germany’s automotive industry is highly illuminating.
All big carmakers have recently changed or are on the verge of changing strategy. DaimlerChrysler has backed out of mass-market cars while Porsche has entered through its control of Volkswagen. In turn VW has dramatically switched course from relentless cost-cutting to a focus on volume growth. Even BMW, often seen as the most stable and conservative manufacturer, is preparing to set out a new strategy in October.
“The car industry is in many ways emblematic of Germany: it is changing,” says Stephen Cheetham, analyst at Sanford Bernstein, the analysis group, in London. “But the real question is has it changed enough to become a reformed alcoholic or is it still just the same old boozy industry as before?”
The reasons for the changes are as varied as the manufacturers themselves, and range from boardroom politics at VW to creating a family legacy at Porsche. But a couple of common themes underpin the changes.
One is German pragmatism. The German manufacturers may not always be the fastest-moving or excel in marketing themselves, but when they get hold of an idea they often will not let go. One example is wage deals where – despite being the highest-paid car workers in the world – “German employees saw which way the wind was blowing and so real wages have actually fallen in the past few years,” as Mr Cheetham says.
Another driver for change currently – and an area where German pragmatism is again being shown – is the debate over reducing carbon dioxide emissions. As many executives such as Michael Ganal, head of sales at BMW, admit, German carmakers allowed themselves to be outflanked initially in the marketing battle. The products of Japanese companies such as Toyota and Honda have established themselves in consumers’ minds as much more environmentally friendly than German gas guzzlers.
But slowly the Germans are fighting back – and the way they know best: through technology. VW already has the Polo Blue Motion, which has lower emissions than the environmentalists’ poster car, the Toyota Prius hybrid. It will present a Golf Blue Motion at the Frankfurt show. Mercedes is proudly touting the value of its clean diesel engines. And BMW is among the companies going the furthest, making huge play of its “efficient dynamics” solutions.
“Never underestimate a German’s ability to find a technical solution,” says Thomas Weber, head of research and development at DaimlerChrysler.
Still that is not a guarantee for success, as a BMW official admits: “The Germans are very engineering-driven: ‘Done that, solved that’. The Americans, and some Japanese, are more: ‘How can I make a buck from that?’”
These drivers are starting to find their way not just into products but entire company strategies. BMW is perhaps the most interesting in this respect, partly because it is the one large manufacturer not to have changed course so far and partly because it has been thinking about it for so long. When Helmut Panke was replaced as chief executive by Norbert Reithofer a year ago at the luxury manufacturer, the incoming head was given a task by the supervisory board.
“We said: ‘Go and come up with a new strategy. You have a year but we want you to look at absolutely everything’. We were worried that BMW had become somewhat complacent and ignored – a little – the threat from competitors such as Audi,” says a supervisory board member.
An executive says: “This is a well-managed company but sometimes you just have to shake things up and say the world is changing faster than we think.”
That year-long thinking is coming to fruition.
It is unclear how radical the changes will be – one official talks of a new “blueprint” not a new strategy – but everything has been considered and a vision for the next 10-15 years should be set out in October.
“What cars will the Chinese be driving in 10 years? What will energy prices be like? What size boots will people want in different models? Do we need another brand to reach all the customers we are targeting?” asks an official rhetorically.
Such thinking has led to an explosion of models, not just at BMW but also across the German car industry.
BMW has gone from its “three sausages” strategy of the 3-, 5- and 7-series to soon having 10 models.
Porsche will soon have four rather than its traditional one while VW is aggressively expanding into as many niches as possible.
The success of that expansion against similar pushes from carmakers worldwide will demonstrate how successful and radical the changes have been – and just how reformed the alcoholic is.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Germany relies on ‘Vorsprung durch Technik’
By Richard Milne
Published: September 11 2007 08:13 | Last updated: September 11 2007 08:13
Every news article about Germany boils down, according to journalistic wisdom, to one question: is the country changing or not? Viewed through this lens, what is taking place in Germany’s automotive industry is highly illuminating.
All big carmakers have recently changed or are on the verge of changing strategy. DaimlerChrysler has backed out of mass-market cars while Porsche has entered through its control of Volkswagen. In turn VW has dramatically switched course from relentless cost-cutting to a focus on volume growth. Even BMW, often seen as the most stable and conservative manufacturer, is preparing to set out a new strategy in October.
“The car industry is in many ways emblematic of Germany: it is changing,” says Stephen Cheetham, analyst at Sanford Bernstein, the analysis group, in London. “But the real question is has it changed enough to become a reformed alcoholic or is it still just the same old boozy industry as before?”
The reasons for the changes are as varied as the manufacturers themselves, and range from boardroom politics at VW to creating a family legacy at Porsche. But a couple of common themes underpin the changes.
One is German pragmatism. The German manufacturers may not always be the fastest-moving or excel in marketing themselves, but when they get hold of an idea they often will not let go. One example is wage deals where – despite being the highest-paid car workers in the world – “German employees saw which way the wind was blowing and so real wages have actually fallen in the past few years,” as Mr Cheetham says.
Another driver for change currently – and an area where German pragmatism is again being shown – is the debate over reducing carbon dioxide emissions. As many executives such as Michael Ganal, head of sales at BMW, admit, German carmakers allowed themselves to be outflanked initially in the marketing battle. The products of Japanese companies such as Toyota and Honda have established themselves in consumers’ minds as much more environmentally friendly than German gas guzzlers.
But slowly the Germans are fighting back – and the way they know best: through technology. VW already has the Polo Blue Motion, which has lower emissions than the environmentalists’ poster car, the Toyota Prius hybrid. It will present a Golf Blue Motion at the Frankfurt show. Mercedes is proudly touting the value of its clean diesel engines. And BMW is among the companies going the furthest, making huge play of its “efficient dynamics” solutions.
“Never underestimate a German’s ability to find a technical solution,” says Thomas Weber, head of research and development at DaimlerChrysler.
Still that is not a guarantee for success, as a BMW official admits: “The Germans are very engineering-driven: ‘Done that, solved that’. The Americans, and some Japanese, are more: ‘How can I make a buck from that?’”
These drivers are starting to find their way not just into products but entire company strategies. BMW is perhaps the most interesting in this respect, partly because it is the one large manufacturer not to have changed course so far and partly because it has been thinking about it for so long. When Helmut Panke was replaced as chief executive by Norbert Reithofer a year ago at the luxury manufacturer, the incoming head was given a task by the supervisory board.
“We said: ‘Go and come up with a new strategy. You have a year but we want you to look at absolutely everything’. We were worried that BMW had become somewhat complacent and ignored – a little – the threat from competitors such as Audi,” says a supervisory board member.
An executive says: “This is a well-managed company but sometimes you just have to shake things up and say the world is changing faster than we think.”
That year-long thinking is coming to fruition.
It is unclear how radical the changes will be – one official talks of a new “blueprint” not a new strategy – but everything has been considered and a vision for the next 10-15 years should be set out in October.
“What cars will the Chinese be driving in 10 years? What will energy prices be like? What size boots will people want in different models? Do we need another brand to reach all the customers we are targeting?” asks an official rhetorically.
Such thinking has led to an explosion of models, not just at BMW but also across the German car industry.
BMW has gone from its “three sausages” strategy of the 3-, 5- and 7-series to soon having 10 models.
Porsche will soon have four rather than its traditional one while VW is aggressively expanding into as many niches as possible.
The success of that expansion against similar pushes from carmakers worldwide will demonstrate how successful and radical the changes have been – and just how reformed the alcoholic is.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
FTD.de - Industrie - Nachrichten - Autoindustrie erwartet Trendwende für 2008
FTD.de - Industrie - Nachrichten - Autoindustrie erwartet Trendwende für 2008
Nach der monatelangen Absatzschwäche auf dem deutschen Automarkt rechnet die Fahrzeugindustrie spätestens 2008 mit einem Aufschwung. In punkto CO2-Ausstoß werfen Umweltschutzverbände der Branche allerdings die Inszenierung einer "Klimashow" vor.
Nach der monatelangen Absatzschwäche auf dem deutschen Automarkt rechnet die Fahrzeugindustrie spätestens 2008 mit einem Aufschwung. In punkto CO2-Ausstoß werfen Umweltschutzverbände der Branche allerdings die Inszenierung einer "Klimashow" vor.
Übernahmegerüchte Der Spiegel will die FTD - Wirtschaft - sueddeutsche.de
Übernahmegerüchte Der Spiegel will die FTD - Wirtschaft - sueddeutsche.de
Der Hamburger Verlag plant offenbar einen Einstieg bei der Financial Times Deutschland. Deren Mutterblatt soll schon länger das Interesse an der FTD verloren haben: Sie schreibt noch immer Verluste.
Der Hamburger Verlag plant offenbar einen Einstieg bei der Financial Times Deutschland. Deren Mutterblatt soll schon länger das Interesse an der FTD verloren haben: Sie schreibt noch immer Verluste.
Monday, September 10, 2007
FT.com / World - Eventful year for German unions
FT.com / World - Eventful year for German unions
Eventful year for German unions
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: September 10 2007 04:03 | Last updated: September 10 2007 04:03
This has been an eventful, even turbulent year for German trade unions. On the positive side, many have been able to win larger pay increases for their members than in previous years, taking advantage of the country’s economic upturn. The IG Metall engineering union led the way with a 4.1 per cent rise in the spring.
More controversially, a rail strike in the summer revealed awkward divisions within the labour movement, as a specialist train drivers’ union broke away from its sister unions to demand a higher pay increase for its members.
Earlier this month IG Metall, Germany’s largest union with 2.3m members, also struck out in a new direction, as its executive board nominated a political moderate – Berthold Huber, the union’s current deputy leader – as the organisation’s next chair. He is expected to replace Jürgen Peters, a leftwing hardliner, at a union congress in November.
Such events come against a number of challenges for a movement that, like in the UK, is struggling to retain influence against a background of globalisation pressures, legal and labour market reforms and falling membership.
German unions retain strong workplace power in manufacturing – still a key sector – and can still flex their muscles over management through co-determination, the legal arrangements allowing employee representatives a say in decision-making at workplace and supervisory board levels.
Yet falling membership and a decline in collective bargaining coverage have led to more critical questions in business and politics about the relevance of seeing unions as key partners.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Eventful year for German unions
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: September 10 2007 04:03 | Last updated: September 10 2007 04:03
This has been an eventful, even turbulent year for German trade unions. On the positive side, many have been able to win larger pay increases for their members than in previous years, taking advantage of the country’s economic upturn. The IG Metall engineering union led the way with a 4.1 per cent rise in the spring.
More controversially, a rail strike in the summer revealed awkward divisions within the labour movement, as a specialist train drivers’ union broke away from its sister unions to demand a higher pay increase for its members.
Earlier this month IG Metall, Germany’s largest union with 2.3m members, also struck out in a new direction, as its executive board nominated a political moderate – Berthold Huber, the union’s current deputy leader – as the organisation’s next chair. He is expected to replace Jürgen Peters, a leftwing hardliner, at a union congress in November.
Such events come against a number of challenges for a movement that, like in the UK, is struggling to retain influence against a background of globalisation pressures, legal and labour market reforms and falling membership.
German unions retain strong workplace power in manufacturing – still a key sector – and can still flex their muscles over management through co-determination, the legal arrangements allowing employee representatives a say in decision-making at workplace and supervisory board levels.
Yet falling membership and a decline in collective bargaining coverage have led to more critical questions in business and politics about the relevance of seeing unions as key partners.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Cohn-Bendit begräbt Angst vor Union
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Cohn-Bendit begräbt Angst vor Union
Der Vordenker der Linken bei den Grünen, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, hält eine Koalition von Union und Grünen im Bund nach der nächsten Bundestagswahl nicht mehr für ausgeschlossen. Das sagte er im FTD-Interview.
Der Vordenker der Linken bei den Grünen, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, hält eine Koalition von Union und Grünen im Bund nach der nächsten Bundestagswahl nicht mehr für ausgeschlossen. Das sagte er im FTD-Interview.
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Germany's government | A coalition of the unwilling | Economist.com
Germany's government | A coalition of the unwilling | Economist.com
At half-time, the grand coalition seems subdued—maybe too much so
THE interval is over, and the actors in Germany's grand coalition have come back onstage. The script for the next two years calls for the Christian Democrats (CDU) and Social Democrats (SPD) to live together until they disband to fight each other in a federal election by September 2009. But it is between the lines that one finds the real plot: complacency and angst, meaning that the second act will hardly be action-packed (unless terrorism strikes, see article).
The government's goals, says the CDU chancellor, Angela Merkel, are to “strengthen the bases of the economic upswing” and “leave nobody behind.” Yet unlike France's president, Nicolas Sarkozy, Ms Merkel has no big plans to achieve them. Boosting long-term growth would take painful reforms that appeal to few, especially when the economy seems to be doing fine without them. There is more talk of inclusion, but the parties disagree over how to deliver it. Both are committed to eliminating the federal budget deficit by 2011, ruling out big spending. “Over the next two years there will be lots of symbolic gestures and nothing real,” predicts Klaus Zimmermann, president of DIW, an economic research institute in Berlin.
For now, symbolism may suffice. Exports are booming, unemployment is falling and the economy may grow by some 2.5% in 2007 and 2008, its best performance in years. In the first half of 2007 the public sector overall recorded a surplus for the first time since unification in 1990. Yet the mood of the three coalition partners (the CDU's Bavarian ally, the Christian Social Union, is the third) is jittery. In January their popularity will be tested in elections in two important states, Hesse and Lower Saxony. Bavaria votes in September 2008.
The SPD is especially nervous. Voters have not forgiven the party for the cuts in unemployment benefits made under Ms Merkel's predecessor, Gerhard Schröder. The Left Party, a new party formed by the ex-communists and some left-wing defectors from the SPD, is luring away traditional supporters. Further liberalising reforms would be electoral poison.
Ms Merkel's coalition-management skills create an illusion of progress. At a recent get-together in a Prussian palace, the cabinet found enough common ground to produce 12 pages of promises, but even the best are only timid steps in the right direction. For example, from November Germany will open its job market to foreign engineering students at German universities and to engineers from all 12 new members of the European Union. And the payroll tax to finance unemployment benefits will be trimmed from 4.2% to 3.9% to encourage hiring.
More might have been hoped for from a coalition with a big majority and a strong economy. The opening to foreign engineers will ease but not resolve a labour shortage that costs industry an estimated €20 billion ($27 billion) in lost output a year. All the other old EU members bar Austria have either opened their labour markets fully to easterners already, or plan to do so by 2009. Holger Schmieding, an economist at Bank of America, reckons that the government could afford to cut unemployment-insurance contributions to 3%, which might create 250,000 new jobs.
The government has bravely introduced a gradual increase in the retirement age (to 67), but it has been less bold in restructuring the health system, which threatens to gobble up an ever rising share of GDP at the expense of investment in education and infrastructure. It has no plans to tackle the network of regulations that makes it expensive to fire workers, and thus risky to hire them. A second instalment of Germany's federal redesign, which would limit states' debts but allow them to raise (or lower) taxes, may just squeak through.
In place of reform, the coalition offers comforting but vague promises. There will be help for the working poor in higher child benefits and subsidies to childless households. The number of school drop-outs will be cut by half by 2010. A bonus will be paid to firms that train more people than average. Workers in soon-to-be-liberalised postal services will get a minimum wage (which the SPD would like to extend across the economy). The government may help states to finance more crèches for children; it has mooted the idea of ten days' paid leave for workers to arrange nursing for sick parents. Such benevolence carries “clear social-democratic handwriting”, boasts the vice-chancellor (and labour minister), Franz Müntefering.
Yet to his dismay, it is Ms Merkel who gets the credit. In most polls, the CDU is ten points ahead of the hapless SPD, which remains divided over whether to defend Mr Schröder's reforms and over its own role in the coalition.
The SPD has championed the coalition's boldest policy, an “integrated energy and climate programme” aimed at cutting Germany's greenhouse-gas emissions by 40% from 1990 levels by 2020. But Ms Merkel is its most visible defender. The foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, is from the SPD (he was Mr Schröder's chief of staff), but it was the chancellor who lectured her hosts about human rights on a trip to China last month. Such stances help to make Ms Merkel appealing to the Greens, who could yet be an alternative to the SPD as a coalition partner.
The odds remain that both the economic upswing and the coalition will survive until the 2009 election. But there are risks to both. As so often, German banks have suffered disproportionately from the subprime mortgage mess in America (see article). If the American economy buckles, Germany's export-led growth could quickly fade. And the SPD may yet be tempted to bail out of the coalition rather than go on seeing Ms Merkel gather both credit and strength.
At half-time, the grand coalition seems subdued—maybe too much so
THE interval is over, and the actors in Germany's grand coalition have come back onstage. The script for the next two years calls for the Christian Democrats (CDU) and Social Democrats (SPD) to live together until they disband to fight each other in a federal election by September 2009. But it is between the lines that one finds the real plot: complacency and angst, meaning that the second act will hardly be action-packed (unless terrorism strikes, see article).
The government's goals, says the CDU chancellor, Angela Merkel, are to “strengthen the bases of the economic upswing” and “leave nobody behind.” Yet unlike France's president, Nicolas Sarkozy, Ms Merkel has no big plans to achieve them. Boosting long-term growth would take painful reforms that appeal to few, especially when the economy seems to be doing fine without them. There is more talk of inclusion, but the parties disagree over how to deliver it. Both are committed to eliminating the federal budget deficit by 2011, ruling out big spending. “Over the next two years there will be lots of symbolic gestures and nothing real,” predicts Klaus Zimmermann, president of DIW, an economic research institute in Berlin.
For now, symbolism may suffice. Exports are booming, unemployment is falling and the economy may grow by some 2.5% in 2007 and 2008, its best performance in years. In the first half of 2007 the public sector overall recorded a surplus for the first time since unification in 1990. Yet the mood of the three coalition partners (the CDU's Bavarian ally, the Christian Social Union, is the third) is jittery. In January their popularity will be tested in elections in two important states, Hesse and Lower Saxony. Bavaria votes in September 2008.
The SPD is especially nervous. Voters have not forgiven the party for the cuts in unemployment benefits made under Ms Merkel's predecessor, Gerhard Schröder. The Left Party, a new party formed by the ex-communists and some left-wing defectors from the SPD, is luring away traditional supporters. Further liberalising reforms would be electoral poison.
Ms Merkel's coalition-management skills create an illusion of progress. At a recent get-together in a Prussian palace, the cabinet found enough common ground to produce 12 pages of promises, but even the best are only timid steps in the right direction. For example, from November Germany will open its job market to foreign engineering students at German universities and to engineers from all 12 new members of the European Union. And the payroll tax to finance unemployment benefits will be trimmed from 4.2% to 3.9% to encourage hiring.
More might have been hoped for from a coalition with a big majority and a strong economy. The opening to foreign engineers will ease but not resolve a labour shortage that costs industry an estimated €20 billion ($27 billion) in lost output a year. All the other old EU members bar Austria have either opened their labour markets fully to easterners already, or plan to do so by 2009. Holger Schmieding, an economist at Bank of America, reckons that the government could afford to cut unemployment-insurance contributions to 3%, which might create 250,000 new jobs.
The government has bravely introduced a gradual increase in the retirement age (to 67), but it has been less bold in restructuring the health system, which threatens to gobble up an ever rising share of GDP at the expense of investment in education and infrastructure. It has no plans to tackle the network of regulations that makes it expensive to fire workers, and thus risky to hire them. A second instalment of Germany's federal redesign, which would limit states' debts but allow them to raise (or lower) taxes, may just squeak through.
In place of reform, the coalition offers comforting but vague promises. There will be help for the working poor in higher child benefits and subsidies to childless households. The number of school drop-outs will be cut by half by 2010. A bonus will be paid to firms that train more people than average. Workers in soon-to-be-liberalised postal services will get a minimum wage (which the SPD would like to extend across the economy). The government may help states to finance more crèches for children; it has mooted the idea of ten days' paid leave for workers to arrange nursing for sick parents. Such benevolence carries “clear social-democratic handwriting”, boasts the vice-chancellor (and labour minister), Franz Müntefering.
Yet to his dismay, it is Ms Merkel who gets the credit. In most polls, the CDU is ten points ahead of the hapless SPD, which remains divided over whether to defend Mr Schröder's reforms and over its own role in the coalition.
The SPD has championed the coalition's boldest policy, an “integrated energy and climate programme” aimed at cutting Germany's greenhouse-gas emissions by 40% from 1990 levels by 2020. But Ms Merkel is its most visible defender. The foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, is from the SPD (he was Mr Schröder's chief of staff), but it was the chancellor who lectured her hosts about human rights on a trip to China last month. Such stances help to make Ms Merkel appealing to the Greens, who could yet be an alternative to the SPD as a coalition partner.
The odds remain that both the economic upswing and the coalition will survive until the 2009 election. But there are risks to both. As so often, German banks have suffered disproportionately from the subprime mortgage mess in America (see article). If the American economy buckles, Germany's export-led growth could quickly fade. And the SPD may yet be tempted to bail out of the coalition rather than go on seeing Ms Merkel gather both credit and strength.
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
FT.com / In depth - ‘Massive’ bomb plot thwarted in Germany
FT.com / In depth - ‘Massive’ bomb plot thwarted in Germany
‘Massive’ bomb plot thwarted in Germany
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: September 5 2007 10:21 | Last updated: September 5 2007 10:21
German security forces have prevented a series of “massive bomb attacks” that could have been more deadly than the Madrid and London bombings, top German officials said on Wednesday.
A German terror cell had planned to use the equivalent of 550kg of TNT explosives to mount simultaneous car bomb attacks on US military and civil targets in Germany, Monika Harms, federal chief prosecutor, told a press conference in Karlsruhe, southern Germany.
German special forces personnel arrested the alleged cell members – two Germans who had converted to Islam and a Turkish national based in Germany – in a raid on Tuesday in the Sauerland region of western Germany.
“This was one of the most serious terror attacks ever planned in Germany,” said Ms Harms, Germany’s top prosecutor. “There could have been a very big death toll,” she added, as the amount of explosives collected by the cell exceeded those used in the Madrid train bombings in 2004 that killed 191 people, and the London transport bombings in 2005 that killed 52 people.
Bars and discos frequented by US citizens, and a US military base in Hanau near Frankfurt may have been among the group’s targets, Ms Harms said.
She refused to confirm reports by security officials that other targets included Frankfurt airport – the largest airport in continental Europe – and the US base in Ramstein, south-western Germany.
The men belonged to the Islamic Jihad Union, a shadowy terror group linked to al-Qaeda that has its roots in Uzbekistan, according to Jörg Ziercke, president of the BKA federal crime agency.
The terror plan was new evidence of the spread of “home-grown” Islamic terrorism in Europe, security experts said. The three men, aged between 22 and 29, were all without work and claiming unemployment benefits in Germany. They had all visited terror training camps in Pakistan in 2006, Mr Ziercke said.
Wolfgang Schäuble, the German interior minister, said the foiled attacks showed that Germany had become a target for Islamic terror attacks and was no longer simply a region where terrorist “sleepers” were based before mounting attacks elsewhere.
A spokesman for the FBI in Washington said US authorities had been “closely co-ordinating with the Germans on this case,” but said there was no imminent threat to the US following the arrests.
Some 300 police were involved in the surveillance operation against the cell that started last December. Chancellor Angela Merkel praised the work of the security forces.
The arrests sparked renewed debate on the need for further tightening of German security laws, in particular by allowing remote computer searches by German security forces.
The cell had obtained 12 vats of hydrogen peroxide weighing 730kg to be used in preparing explosives.
Germany has not been the target of a major Islamic terror attack in recent years, but several alleged terror cells have been broken up and suspects arrested, for instance a Lebanese man charged earlier this year with planning a series of train bombs in 2006.
Three of the pilots involved in the September 11 2001 terror attacks had been living in Hamburg, northern Germany.
Danes put bombmaking suspects on trial
Four alleged bombmakers went on trial in Copenhagen on Wednesday, a day after Danish police arrested eight other alleged Islamic militants suspected of plotting a bomb attack, writes Robert Anderson in Stockholm.
Two Palestinians, an Iraqi Kurd and a Dane pleaded innocent to charges of buying chemicals and equipment to produce explosives. The men were arrested last year in Odense after a tip-off from an informant.
Police allege they were caught with a bomb-making manual and 50 grammes of triacetone triperoxide, used in the 2005 London bombings.
The eight new suspects – who are of Afghan, Pakistani, Somali and Turkish origin – were arrested after police raided 11 addresses in the Danish capital on Monday night. All of the eight new suspects have been charged with terrorist offences and two have been remanded in custody.
Police, who worked with foreign security services, believe that these two suspects are the first militants caught in Denmark with direct links to al-Qaeda.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
‘Massive’ bomb plot thwarted in Germany
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: September 5 2007 10:21 | Last updated: September 5 2007 10:21
German security forces have prevented a series of “massive bomb attacks” that could have been more deadly than the Madrid and London bombings, top German officials said on Wednesday.
A German terror cell had planned to use the equivalent of 550kg of TNT explosives to mount simultaneous car bomb attacks on US military and civil targets in Germany, Monika Harms, federal chief prosecutor, told a press conference in Karlsruhe, southern Germany.
German special forces personnel arrested the alleged cell members – two Germans who had converted to Islam and a Turkish national based in Germany – in a raid on Tuesday in the Sauerland region of western Germany.
“This was one of the most serious terror attacks ever planned in Germany,” said Ms Harms, Germany’s top prosecutor. “There could have been a very big death toll,” she added, as the amount of explosives collected by the cell exceeded those used in the Madrid train bombings in 2004 that killed 191 people, and the London transport bombings in 2005 that killed 52 people.
Bars and discos frequented by US citizens, and a US military base in Hanau near Frankfurt may have been among the group’s targets, Ms Harms said.
She refused to confirm reports by security officials that other targets included Frankfurt airport – the largest airport in continental Europe – and the US base in Ramstein, south-western Germany.
The men belonged to the Islamic Jihad Union, a shadowy terror group linked to al-Qaeda that has its roots in Uzbekistan, according to Jörg Ziercke, president of the BKA federal crime agency.
The terror plan was new evidence of the spread of “home-grown” Islamic terrorism in Europe, security experts said. The three men, aged between 22 and 29, were all without work and claiming unemployment benefits in Germany. They had all visited terror training camps in Pakistan in 2006, Mr Ziercke said.
Wolfgang Schäuble, the German interior minister, said the foiled attacks showed that Germany had become a target for Islamic terror attacks and was no longer simply a region where terrorist “sleepers” were based before mounting attacks elsewhere.
A spokesman for the FBI in Washington said US authorities had been “closely co-ordinating with the Germans on this case,” but said there was no imminent threat to the US following the arrests.
Some 300 police were involved in the surveillance operation against the cell that started last December. Chancellor Angela Merkel praised the work of the security forces.
The arrests sparked renewed debate on the need for further tightening of German security laws, in particular by allowing remote computer searches by German security forces.
The cell had obtained 12 vats of hydrogen peroxide weighing 730kg to be used in preparing explosives.
Germany has not been the target of a major Islamic terror attack in recent years, but several alleged terror cells have been broken up and suspects arrested, for instance a Lebanese man charged earlier this year with planning a series of train bombs in 2006.
Three of the pilots involved in the September 11 2001 terror attacks had been living in Hamburg, northern Germany.
Danes put bombmaking suspects on trial
Four alleged bombmakers went on trial in Copenhagen on Wednesday, a day after Danish police arrested eight other alleged Islamic militants suspected of plotting a bomb attack, writes Robert Anderson in Stockholm.
Two Palestinians, an Iraqi Kurd and a Dane pleaded innocent to charges of buying chemicals and equipment to produce explosives. The men were arrested last year in Odense after a tip-off from an informant.
Police allege they were caught with a bomb-making manual and 50 grammes of triacetone triperoxide, used in the 2005 London bombings.
The eight new suspects – who are of Afghan, Pakistani, Somali and Turkish origin – were arrested after police raided 11 addresses in the Danish capital on Monday night. All of the eight new suspects have been charged with terrorist offences and two have been remanded in custody.
Police, who worked with foreign security services, believe that these two suspects are the first militants caught in Denmark with direct links to al-Qaeda.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
FT.com / Columnists / European View - Germany’s smaller banks – the time is ripe for a cull
FT.com / Columnists / European View - Germany’s smaller banks – the time is ripe for a cull
Germany’s smaller banks – the time is ripe for a cull
By Paul Betts
Published: September 5 2007 18:22 | Last updated: September 5 2007 18:22
Hermann Simon, the management consultant, will soon release a paean to the small and medium-sized manufacturers that make up the backbone of Germany’s economy. “Hidden Champions of the 21st Century” highlights how, in an age of globalisation, German engineering companies have surprisingly become even more competitive.
With the current financial crisis badly affecting German banks, it raises the question as to why Germany can produce world-beating manufacturers and world-losing banks. Furthermore, why is having hundreds of engineering groups seen as a good thing and hundreds of banks – as Germany has – a bad one?
Simon suggests part of the answer lies in focus. The German Mittelstand – the famous small companies that employ more than half of blue-collar workers – operate in highly specific niches where there is little competition. That makes their local markets small. But globalisation, with all the countries it opens up, makes that market large again.
Banks have a different problem. The local Sparkassen or Landesbanken (saving and regional banks) have a small, geographically defined market. But they have no expertise that is exportable and little desire to leave their home regions, even for mergers. Even the largest of banks, with the possible exception of Deutsche Bank, have struggled outside the country, as shown by the expansions and then contractions of Commerzbank and WestLB.
Perhaps it is too late for German banks. But paradoxically they could well have the best opportunity in decades to become more competitive. The credit crunch has revealed the underlying problems in many banks’ models. There will never be a Mittelstand of banks, so the time is ripe for Sparkassen and Landesbanken to put their local pride aside and consolidate as quickly as possible.
Dogfights at Airbus
The new Airbus A380 super jumbo has acquired an enviable image as the latest toy of the international jet set. Roman Abramovich, the Russian billionaire and owner of Chelsea football club, on Wednesday flatly denied a report in the French press that he is the mystery individual to have placed an order for the $300m-plus (€219m) jet.
Such speculation, sparked by Airbus’ revelation of the anonymous order at this summer’s Paris air show, has certainly added a touch of glamour to the European aircraft manufacturer after two years of internal management and industrial turmoil. But nobody should be fooled.
This summer’s compromise between the French and German shareholders – blessed by their respective governments – already appears to be fraying. The deal to streamline the governance structure of EADS, the Airbus parent, may have eliminated some difficulties, but at the same time it may have provoked new ones.
The agreement to create just one EADS chairman, one EADS chief executive and one Airbus chief executive was supposed to help put an end to the infighting between the German and French camps and other internal rivalries that has undermined the European group.
Unfortunately, the infighting does not seem to have stopped. Indeed, it is continuing at Airbus, where Tom Enders, the new German chief executive, appears to be locked in a bitter power struggle with Fabrice Brégier, the French chief operating officer who had also been vying for some time for the top Airbus job.
So the sorry saga goes on at a time when both Airbus and EADS need strong leadership to resolve enduring industrial problems and counter the threat from rival Boeing. Sure, the Boeing 787 may be delivered at least six months late. But this is neither here nor there compared with the A380’s two-year delay.
More worrying, Boeing appears to be preparing an assault on another front by launching a new generation single-aisle aircraft to replace the Boeing 737. It is studying an innovative engine developed by Pratt & Whitney to power the new aircraft that would challenge the traditional Airbus money-spinner, the A320 and its derivatives.
Airbus not only has to fix the remaining problems on the A380, but it is only just embarking on the development of the A350 to compete against the Boeing 787. Airbus and EADS believed they had a bit more time before they had to address the replacement of the A321. And remember, they have not yet even sorted out with their shareholders how to pay for the A350, never mind a new A320 programme.
Faced with such challenges, decisive leadership is crucial. Unfortunately, there are already mutterings that the highly regarded Louis Gallois, the new EADS sole chief executive, is spending too much of his time trying to build bridges and consensus between the French and German camps rather than taking tough and unpopular decisions with both the French and Germans.
european.view@ft.com
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Germany’s smaller banks – the time is ripe for a cull
By Paul Betts
Published: September 5 2007 18:22 | Last updated: September 5 2007 18:22
Hermann Simon, the management consultant, will soon release a paean to the small and medium-sized manufacturers that make up the backbone of Germany’s economy. “Hidden Champions of the 21st Century” highlights how, in an age of globalisation, German engineering companies have surprisingly become even more competitive.
With the current financial crisis badly affecting German banks, it raises the question as to why Germany can produce world-beating manufacturers and world-losing banks. Furthermore, why is having hundreds of engineering groups seen as a good thing and hundreds of banks – as Germany has – a bad one?
Simon suggests part of the answer lies in focus. The German Mittelstand – the famous small companies that employ more than half of blue-collar workers – operate in highly specific niches where there is little competition. That makes their local markets small. But globalisation, with all the countries it opens up, makes that market large again.
Banks have a different problem. The local Sparkassen or Landesbanken (saving and regional banks) have a small, geographically defined market. But they have no expertise that is exportable and little desire to leave their home regions, even for mergers. Even the largest of banks, with the possible exception of Deutsche Bank, have struggled outside the country, as shown by the expansions and then contractions of Commerzbank and WestLB.
Perhaps it is too late for German banks. But paradoxically they could well have the best opportunity in decades to become more competitive. The credit crunch has revealed the underlying problems in many banks’ models. There will never be a Mittelstand of banks, so the time is ripe for Sparkassen and Landesbanken to put their local pride aside and consolidate as quickly as possible.
Dogfights at Airbus
The new Airbus A380 super jumbo has acquired an enviable image as the latest toy of the international jet set. Roman Abramovich, the Russian billionaire and owner of Chelsea football club, on Wednesday flatly denied a report in the French press that he is the mystery individual to have placed an order for the $300m-plus (€219m) jet.
Such speculation, sparked by Airbus’ revelation of the anonymous order at this summer’s Paris air show, has certainly added a touch of glamour to the European aircraft manufacturer after two years of internal management and industrial turmoil. But nobody should be fooled.
This summer’s compromise between the French and German shareholders – blessed by their respective governments – already appears to be fraying. The deal to streamline the governance structure of EADS, the Airbus parent, may have eliminated some difficulties, but at the same time it may have provoked new ones.
The agreement to create just one EADS chairman, one EADS chief executive and one Airbus chief executive was supposed to help put an end to the infighting between the German and French camps and other internal rivalries that has undermined the European group.
Unfortunately, the infighting does not seem to have stopped. Indeed, it is continuing at Airbus, where Tom Enders, the new German chief executive, appears to be locked in a bitter power struggle with Fabrice Brégier, the French chief operating officer who had also been vying for some time for the top Airbus job.
So the sorry saga goes on at a time when both Airbus and EADS need strong leadership to resolve enduring industrial problems and counter the threat from rival Boeing. Sure, the Boeing 787 may be delivered at least six months late. But this is neither here nor there compared with the A380’s two-year delay.
More worrying, Boeing appears to be preparing an assault on another front by launching a new generation single-aisle aircraft to replace the Boeing 737. It is studying an innovative engine developed by Pratt & Whitney to power the new aircraft that would challenge the traditional Airbus money-spinner, the A320 and its derivatives.
Airbus not only has to fix the remaining problems on the A380, but it is only just embarking on the development of the A350 to compete against the Boeing 787. Airbus and EADS believed they had a bit more time before they had to address the replacement of the A321. And remember, they have not yet even sorted out with their shareholders how to pay for the A350, never mind a new A320 programme.
Faced with such challenges, decisive leadership is crucial. Unfortunately, there are already mutterings that the highly regarded Louis Gallois, the new EADS sole chief executive, is spending too much of his time trying to build bridges and consensus between the French and German camps rather than taking tough and unpopular decisions with both the French and Germans.
european.view@ft.com
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Monday, September 03, 2007
Medien in Deutschland Vor 50 Jahren startete das Magazin ''konkret'' - Kultur - sueddeutsche.de
Medien in Deutschland Vor 50 Jahren startete das Magazin ''konkret'' - Kultur - sueddeutsche.de
Vor 50 Jahren startete das Magazin "konkret"
Im Namen der Wahrheit und mit Geld aus der DDR begann vor einem halben Jahrhundert das Magazin konkret. Die Liste der prominenten Autoren ist lang, geschrieben wurde gegen Nazis, die Wiederbewaffung - und alles, was die anderen nicht brachten. Heute gibt es das Heft immer noch.
Vor 50 Jahren startete das Magazin "konkret"
Im Namen der Wahrheit und mit Geld aus der DDR begann vor einem halben Jahrhundert das Magazin konkret. Die Liste der prominenten Autoren ist lang, geschrieben wurde gegen Nazis, die Wiederbewaffung - und alles, was die anderen nicht brachten. Heute gibt es das Heft immer noch.
Sunday, September 02, 2007
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Hamburg auf dem Weg zur Welthauptstadt
FTD.de - Deutschland - Nachrichten - Hamburg auf dem Weg zur Welthauptstadt
Hamburg profitiert von der Globalisierung. Der Hafen entwickelt sich stürmisch, der Handel floriert. Von allen Bundesländern schneidet die Stadt wirtschaftlich am besten ab. Nun will sie zur Weltmetropole aufsteigen.
Hamburg profitiert von der Globalisierung. Der Hafen entwickelt sich stürmisch, der Handel floriert. Von allen Bundesländern schneidet die Stadt wirtschaftlich am besten ab. Nun will sie zur Weltmetropole aufsteigen.
Friday, August 31, 2007
IFA-Trend Unbeschreiblich weiblich - Computer - sueddeutsche.de
IFA-Trend Unbeschreiblich weiblich - Computer - sueddeutsche.de
IFA-Trend
Unbeschreiblich weiblich
Schwarze Hifi-Geräte, überdimensionierte Lautsprecher - die Unterhaltungselektronik ist eine Männerdomäne. Doch die Industrie denkt um. Mit Glitzer und technischem Komfort versucht sie, Frauen zu gewinnen.
IFA-Trend
Unbeschreiblich weiblich
Schwarze Hifi-Geräte, überdimensionierte Lautsprecher - die Unterhaltungselektronik ist eine Männerdomäne. Doch die Industrie denkt um. Mit Glitzer und technischem Komfort versucht sie, Frauen zu gewinnen.
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Monday, August 27, 2007
FT.com / Home UK / UK - Germany's Landesbanken face obstacles on path to consolidation
FT.com / Home UK / UK - Germany's Landesbanken face obstacles on path to consolidation
Germany's Landesbanken face obstacles on path to consolidation
By Ivar Simensen in Frankfurt
Published: August 27 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 27 2007 03:00
LBBW's takeover of Sachsen LB will likely be followed by more consolidation in Germany's public bank sector, but power games among their owners are bound to complicate the process.
The liquidity squeeze in the capital markets has already had a lasting impact on the German banking sector. The rescue of Sachsen LB, after it was unable to provide credit facilities it had pledged to one of its investment funds, yesterday led to the Landesbank for the state of Saxony being sold to LBBW, its bigger peer.
Many banks have come under pressure to merge, after the most recent market turmoil has unveiled that they are too small and unprofitable on their own.
"I am convinced that we need a further consolidation in the Landesbanken," said Peer Steinbrück, finance minister, at the end of last week.
The Landesbanken have changed dramatically from their 19th century roots, when they were founded to support local business. For decades, the Landesbank was a cornerstone in the region's economy, acting as the core corporate lender and central bank to the local savings banks. But a few years ago the banks' position started to wane.
The banks were already facing rising competition from private and co-operative banks, the two other pillars of Germany's three-pillar banking system, when the economic downturn in 2002 sent bad loans surging. Two years ago the banks lost their state guarantees, which had allowed them to borrow at cheaper rates than their commercial rivals, creating savings they could pass on to their customers.
Falling profits at home forced the Landesbanken to change their business models and seek new revenue sources. Each bank chose a different strategy, but all started investing more in the capital markets, via investment vehicles that required little capital.
"It all stems from the end of the state guarantees," said a senior executive at one Landesbank, who declined to be named. "It changed the way they behaved. They went into more risky funds. It was a pattern across all Landesbanken, but some did it irresponsibly."
The varying degrees of success in establishing a new business model will dictate who dominates the consolidation process in the future. The largest players, Landesbank Baden-Würtemberg and Bayern LB, have clearly expressed their desire to consolidate.
The takeover of Sachsen LB will be followed by at least one deal.
WestLB is working on finding a partner, after its attempts to build a presence in investment banking have brought it into severe difficulties more than once.
Politicians in North-Rhine Westphalia had already decided to divest the state's stake in the bank when it lost more than €200m this year on failed speculation in the stock market.
As the deadline for potential M&A advisers to audition for WestLB expired at midday on Friday (August 24), Stuttgart's LBBW will again line up in the front line of suitors.
However, unlike in commercial takeovers, which are by and large decided by price, based on synergies, takeovers in the public banking sector are complicated by the diverging motives of the owners.
Political sensitivities and local history also make synergies hard to achieve. A merged WestLB-LBBW would have five corporate headquarters - in Düsseldorf, Münster, Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Talks of a deal have already triggered protests by politicians worried their town will lose influence and jobs.
"The history of the Landesbanken sector has been about the battle between the local politicians and the savings banks associations," said a banker in Frankfurt.
In North-Rhine Westphalia, the situation is further complicated by an apparent power struggle between the two savings bank associations that together with the state own WestLB.
The Landesbanken can not even count on the support of its own trade association.
Despite all being members of the German savings banks association (DSGV), thesavings banks and Landesbanken are "far from a happy family," said another senior advisor to German banks.
"The savings banks associations are worried that LBBW could become too powerful," said a Landesbank executive.
Indeed Heinrich Haasis, president of DSGV, and Siegfried Jaschinski, chief executive of LBBW, have already clashed once this year, in the auction for Landesbank Berlin.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Germany's Landesbanken face obstacles on path to consolidation
By Ivar Simensen in Frankfurt
Published: August 27 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 27 2007 03:00
LBBW's takeover of Sachsen LB will likely be followed by more consolidation in Germany's public bank sector, but power games among their owners are bound to complicate the process.
The liquidity squeeze in the capital markets has already had a lasting impact on the German banking sector. The rescue of Sachsen LB, after it was unable to provide credit facilities it had pledged to one of its investment funds, yesterday led to the Landesbank for the state of Saxony being sold to LBBW, its bigger peer.
Many banks have come under pressure to merge, after the most recent market turmoil has unveiled that they are too small and unprofitable on their own.
"I am convinced that we need a further consolidation in the Landesbanken," said Peer Steinbrück, finance minister, at the end of last week.
The Landesbanken have changed dramatically from their 19th century roots, when they were founded to support local business. For decades, the Landesbank was a cornerstone in the region's economy, acting as the core corporate lender and central bank to the local savings banks. But a few years ago the banks' position started to wane.
The banks were already facing rising competition from private and co-operative banks, the two other pillars of Germany's three-pillar banking system, when the economic downturn in 2002 sent bad loans surging. Two years ago the banks lost their state guarantees, which had allowed them to borrow at cheaper rates than their commercial rivals, creating savings they could pass on to their customers.
Falling profits at home forced the Landesbanken to change their business models and seek new revenue sources. Each bank chose a different strategy, but all started investing more in the capital markets, via investment vehicles that required little capital.
"It all stems from the end of the state guarantees," said a senior executive at one Landesbank, who declined to be named. "It changed the way they behaved. They went into more risky funds. It was a pattern across all Landesbanken, but some did it irresponsibly."
The varying degrees of success in establishing a new business model will dictate who dominates the consolidation process in the future. The largest players, Landesbank Baden-Würtemberg and Bayern LB, have clearly expressed their desire to consolidate.
The takeover of Sachsen LB will be followed by at least one deal.
WestLB is working on finding a partner, after its attempts to build a presence in investment banking have brought it into severe difficulties more than once.
Politicians in North-Rhine Westphalia had already decided to divest the state's stake in the bank when it lost more than €200m this year on failed speculation in the stock market.
As the deadline for potential M&A advisers to audition for WestLB expired at midday on Friday (August 24), Stuttgart's LBBW will again line up in the front line of suitors.
However, unlike in commercial takeovers, which are by and large decided by price, based on synergies, takeovers in the public banking sector are complicated by the diverging motives of the owners.
Political sensitivities and local history also make synergies hard to achieve. A merged WestLB-LBBW would have five corporate headquarters - in Düsseldorf, Münster, Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Talks of a deal have already triggered protests by politicians worried their town will lose influence and jobs.
"The history of the Landesbanken sector has been about the battle between the local politicians and the savings banks associations," said a banker in Frankfurt.
In North-Rhine Westphalia, the situation is further complicated by an apparent power struggle between the two savings bank associations that together with the state own WestLB.
The Landesbanken can not even count on the support of its own trade association.
Despite all being members of the German savings banks association (DSGV), thesavings banks and Landesbanken are "far from a happy family," said another senior advisor to German banks.
"The savings banks associations are worried that LBBW could become too powerful," said a Landesbank executive.
Indeed Heinrich Haasis, president of DSGV, and Siegfried Jaschinski, chief executive of LBBW, have already clashed once this year, in the auction for Landesbank Berlin.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Friday, August 24, 2007
FT.com / Home UK / UK - Germany celebrates surplus for first time since 1989
FT.com / Home UK / UK - Germany celebrates surplus for first time since 1989
Germany celebrates surplus for first time since 1989
By Bertrand Benoit in Berlin
Published: August 24 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 24 2007 03:00
After nearly 20 years of public deficits, Germany generated a budget surplus in the first half of the year, consecrating the country's transformation from fiscal delinquent to champion of financial rectitude.
Figures released yesterday by the Federal Statistical Office showed the public sector - the federal and regional governments and the social security system - had booked a €1.2bn ($1.6bn, £812m) surplus in the six months to July against a €23bn deficit in the same period last year.
The pace of Germany's fiscal consolidation, largely due to booming tax revenues on the back of the economic recovery, has taken both observers and the finance ministry by surprise, with the government still forecasting a deficit of 0.5 per cent of gross domestic product this year.
The European Commission welcomed the news while Angela Merkel, the chancellor, said this was "something that has not happened for a long time, though we should not rest on our laurels".
Holger Schmieding, chief Europe economist at Bank of America, said that "given the magnitude of the improvement on last year, I would now likely project a minor surplus already this year".
Alfred Boss, public finance expert at the IfW economic institute in Kiel, who correctly predicted the half-year figure, now expects a full-year surplus of €2bn-€3bn.
This would be a historic milestone. With the exception of the second half of 2000, when the government booked a huge one-off windfall from the auction of third-generation mobile phone licences, Germany has achieved a net lending position only twice in 34 years - in 1989 and 1973.
From 2002 to 2005, as the economy was stagnating and unemployment rocketing, Berlin repeatedly breached the European Union's fiscal rules, which ban public-sector deficits of more than 3 per cent of GDP. Since then, however, the economy has rebounded vigorously, helping to fill the state's coffers.
"Germany has been much stricter in its expenditure control than most other countries", said Mr Schmieding, pointing to the 0.7 per cent rise in public spending in the first half. "The fiscal reins are still tighter than in France, the UK, the US and almost any other comparable economy.
"Having said that, most of the good news on the expenditure side is over," he said. "From now on we will see a very gradual erosion of public discipline."
The finance ministry warned against such a relaxation in its monthly report yesterday, saying there was "no margin for tax cuts beyond those included in the recently adopted corporate tax reform".
Peer Steinbrück, finance minister, said in a German newspaper interview, "those calling for tax cuts now are shamelessly advocating a return to the policies that left us with a €1,500bn debt mountain".
The minister is concerned that the development could weaken his hand as Ms -Merkel's cabinet, which is today concluding its mid-term conclave north of Berlin, discusses potentially costly policies.
Among the steps being floated are higher unemployment benefits, new family allowances, more spending on education and an ambitious climate-change package, including tax incentives.
Meanwhile, corporate tax reform, which takes effect next year, will cost €25.3bn between 2008 and 2011 while rising interest rates are boosting yearly repayments linked to the public debt.
The detail of the yesterdays figures showed a sharp increase in revenues from income and corporate tax - up 29.8 and 11.9 per cent respectively - reflecting the steep fall in unemployment over the past two years, a gradual rise in wages and record corporate profits.
"There is a trend," said Dietrich Stache of the Statistical Office, "but people should not extrapolate the first-half figures to the full year as the pattern of expenditures and revenues varies greatly between the first and second half."
The government, for instance, receives an inflow of money from the Bundesbank's profits in the first half while Christmas bonuses and seasonal sales generate more income and value-added tax in the second half.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Germany celebrates surplus for first time since 1989
By Bertrand Benoit in Berlin
Published: August 24 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 24 2007 03:00
After nearly 20 years of public deficits, Germany generated a budget surplus in the first half of the year, consecrating the country's transformation from fiscal delinquent to champion of financial rectitude.
Figures released yesterday by the Federal Statistical Office showed the public sector - the federal and regional governments and the social security system - had booked a €1.2bn ($1.6bn, £812m) surplus in the six months to July against a €23bn deficit in the same period last year.
The pace of Germany's fiscal consolidation, largely due to booming tax revenues on the back of the economic recovery, has taken both observers and the finance ministry by surprise, with the government still forecasting a deficit of 0.5 per cent of gross domestic product this year.
The European Commission welcomed the news while Angela Merkel, the chancellor, said this was "something that has not happened for a long time, though we should not rest on our laurels".
Holger Schmieding, chief Europe economist at Bank of America, said that "given the magnitude of the improvement on last year, I would now likely project a minor surplus already this year".
Alfred Boss, public finance expert at the IfW economic institute in Kiel, who correctly predicted the half-year figure, now expects a full-year surplus of €2bn-€3bn.
This would be a historic milestone. With the exception of the second half of 2000, when the government booked a huge one-off windfall from the auction of third-generation mobile phone licences, Germany has achieved a net lending position only twice in 34 years - in 1989 and 1973.
From 2002 to 2005, as the economy was stagnating and unemployment rocketing, Berlin repeatedly breached the European Union's fiscal rules, which ban public-sector deficits of more than 3 per cent of GDP. Since then, however, the economy has rebounded vigorously, helping to fill the state's coffers.
"Germany has been much stricter in its expenditure control than most other countries", said Mr Schmieding, pointing to the 0.7 per cent rise in public spending in the first half. "The fiscal reins are still tighter than in France, the UK, the US and almost any other comparable economy.
"Having said that, most of the good news on the expenditure side is over," he said. "From now on we will see a very gradual erosion of public discipline."
The finance ministry warned against such a relaxation in its monthly report yesterday, saying there was "no margin for tax cuts beyond those included in the recently adopted corporate tax reform".
Peer Steinbrück, finance minister, said in a German newspaper interview, "those calling for tax cuts now are shamelessly advocating a return to the policies that left us with a €1,500bn debt mountain".
The minister is concerned that the development could weaken his hand as Ms -Merkel's cabinet, which is today concluding its mid-term conclave north of Berlin, discusses potentially costly policies.
Among the steps being floated are higher unemployment benefits, new family allowances, more spending on education and an ambitious climate-change package, including tax incentives.
Meanwhile, corporate tax reform, which takes effect next year, will cost €25.3bn between 2008 and 2011 while rising interest rates are boosting yearly repayments linked to the public debt.
The detail of the yesterdays figures showed a sharp increase in revenues from income and corporate tax - up 29.8 and 11.9 per cent respectively - reflecting the steep fall in unemployment over the past two years, a gradual rise in wages and record corporate profits.
"There is a trend," said Dietrich Stache of the Statistical Office, "but people should not extrapolate the first-half figures to the full year as the pattern of expenditures and revenues varies greatly between the first and second half."
The government, for instance, receives an inflow of money from the Bundesbank's profits in the first half while Christmas bonuses and seasonal sales generate more income and value-added tax in the second half.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Kabinettsklausur in Meseberg Regierung öffnet Arbeitsmarkt für Ausländer - Deutschland - sueddeutsche.de
Kabinettsklausur in Meseberg Regierung öffnet Arbeitsmarkt für Ausländer - Deutschland - sueddeutsche.de
Erste Ergebnisse der Kabinettsklausur in Meseberg: Um dem Mangel an Fachkräften in Deutschland entgegenzutreten, will die Bundesregierung den Arbeitsmarkt für osteuropäische Ingenieure in einzelnen Branchen öffnen. Zudem verabschiedete das Kabinett den Klimaschutzpakt.
Erste Ergebnisse der Kabinettsklausur in Meseberg: Um dem Mangel an Fachkräften in Deutschland entgegenzutreten, will die Bundesregierung den Arbeitsmarkt für osteuropäische Ingenieure in einzelnen Branchen öffnen. Zudem verabschiedete das Kabinett den Klimaschutzpakt.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
FT.com / Home UK / UK - Germany's skills gap costs it €20bn a year
FT.com / Home UK / UK - Germany's skills gap costs it €20bn a year
Germany's skills gap costs it €20bn a year
By Bertrand Benoit in Berlin
Published: August 21 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 21 2007 03:00
Germany's chronic skills shortage is costing its economy up to €20bn ($27bn, £13.6bn) a year, or one percentage point of gross domestic product, according to a study commissioned by the economics ministry.
The failure of Germany's education system to foster skills required by its fast-growing export industry could inflict "long-term damage" to Europe's largest economy, Michael Glos,economics minister, saidyesterday.
The publication, the first attempt at putting a price on Germany's skills bottleneck, comes as the cabinet of chancellor Angela Merkel is preparing to meet at Meseberg, north of Berlin, on Thursday for its two-day mid-term conclave.
Government officials said the "grand coalition" of Christian and Social Democrats had agreed on a "national qualification offensive" aimed at addressing the skills problem.
This matched proposals unveiled by Mr Glos yesterday, including more public and private spending on education and closer co-operation between business and academia. He also urged universities to adapt to the market's requirements and companies to hire more women, older workers and foreigners living in Germany.
The minister was cautious in advocating more immigration, however, reflecting concern among the ruling parties about the vote-losing potential of opening Germany's tight borders.
Currently, non-EU residents who wish to work in Germany must have a yearly income of €80,000. Germany also has the toughest restrictions in the European Union on citizens from new member states.
The skills shortage has become a source of tension between business and politics. While the large industry federations have called for a relaxation of Germany's immigration laws, politicians have accused companies of preferring cheap foreign labour over costly in-house training.
"There is no short-term solution to this problem," said Oliver Koppel, economist a the IW Institute on the German Economy and author of the study. "The eastern European graduates who would have come a few years ago are all in the UK and the US now."
Even there, there is little the federal government can do directly to boost university budgets since education falls within the remit of 16 state governments.
Mr Koppel's study was based on a survey of 2,400 companies, about 85 per cent of which have returned their questionnaires. The cost of the skills shortage was calculated by multiplying the number of unfilled vacancies by a worker's average contribution to Germany's GDP.
Though the estimate of €20bn might appear high, he said, the figure reflected only direct costs. "There are a range of indirect costs too that we did not take into account."
The survey showed the drought of engineers, natural scientists and programmers was acute in sectors with high research and development budgets.
Carmakers, capital goods manufacturers and electronics companies, some of Germany's best export sectors, were among the most affected.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Germany's skills gap costs it €20bn a year
By Bertrand Benoit in Berlin
Published: August 21 2007 03:00 | Last updated: August 21 2007 03:00
Germany's chronic skills shortage is costing its economy up to €20bn ($27bn, £13.6bn) a year, or one percentage point of gross domestic product, according to a study commissioned by the economics ministry.
The failure of Germany's education system to foster skills required by its fast-growing export industry could inflict "long-term damage" to Europe's largest economy, Michael Glos,economics minister, saidyesterday.
The publication, the first attempt at putting a price on Germany's skills bottleneck, comes as the cabinet of chancellor Angela Merkel is preparing to meet at Meseberg, north of Berlin, on Thursday for its two-day mid-term conclave.
Government officials said the "grand coalition" of Christian and Social Democrats had agreed on a "national qualification offensive" aimed at addressing the skills problem.
This matched proposals unveiled by Mr Glos yesterday, including more public and private spending on education and closer co-operation between business and academia. He also urged universities to adapt to the market's requirements and companies to hire more women, older workers and foreigners living in Germany.
The minister was cautious in advocating more immigration, however, reflecting concern among the ruling parties about the vote-losing potential of opening Germany's tight borders.
Currently, non-EU residents who wish to work in Germany must have a yearly income of €80,000. Germany also has the toughest restrictions in the European Union on citizens from new member states.
The skills shortage has become a source of tension between business and politics. While the large industry federations have called for a relaxation of Germany's immigration laws, politicians have accused companies of preferring cheap foreign labour over costly in-house training.
"There is no short-term solution to this problem," said Oliver Koppel, economist a the IW Institute on the German Economy and author of the study. "The eastern European graduates who would have come a few years ago are all in the UK and the US now."
Even there, there is little the federal government can do directly to boost university budgets since education falls within the remit of 16 state governments.
Mr Koppel's study was based on a survey of 2,400 companies, about 85 per cent of which have returned their questionnaires. The cost of the skills shortage was calculated by multiplying the number of unfilled vacancies by a worker's average contribution to Germany's GDP.
Though the estimate of €20bn might appear high, he said, the figure reflected only direct costs. "There are a range of indirect costs too that we did not take into account."
The survey showed the drought of engineers, natural scientists and programmers was acute in sectors with high research and development budgets.
Carmakers, capital goods manufacturers and electronics companies, some of Germany's best export sectors, were among the most affected.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Friday, August 17, 2007
Bund - Politik - FAZ.NET - Terrorismus: Frühere RAF-Terroristin Haule kommt frei
Bund - Politik - FAZ.NET - Terrorismus: Frühere RAF-Terroristin Haule kommt frei
17. August 2007
Die ehemalige RAF-Terroristin Eva Haule wird nach 21 Jahren aus dem Gefängnis entlassen. Das Oberlandesgericht (OLG) Frankfurt am Main entschied in einem am Freitag veröffentlichten Beschluss, den Rest ihrer lebenslangen Freiheitsstrafe zur Bewährung auszusetzen. Von der inzwischen 53 Jahre alten Haule gehe keine Gefahr mehr für die Allgemeinheit aus, erklärte das Gericht.
17. August 2007
Die ehemalige RAF-Terroristin Eva Haule wird nach 21 Jahren aus dem Gefängnis entlassen. Das Oberlandesgericht (OLG) Frankfurt am Main entschied in einem am Freitag veröffentlichten Beschluss, den Rest ihrer lebenslangen Freiheitsstrafe zur Bewährung auszusetzen. Von der inzwischen 53 Jahre alten Haule gehe keine Gefahr mehr für die Allgemeinheit aus, erklärte das Gericht.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Bücher - Feuilleton - FAZ.NET - Buchpreis: „Außergewöhnliche Vielfalt und Vitalität“
Bücher - Feuilleton - FAZ.NET - Buchpreis: „Außergewöhnliche Vielfalt und Vitalität“
15. August 2007
Die Jury für den Deutschen Buchpreis 2007 hat 20 deutschsprachige Belletristik-Werke für die Auszeichnung nominiert. Der Preis ist mit insgesamt 37.500 Euro dotiert und wird zum dritten Mal vergeben. „Ohne uns von Prominenz verführen oder von Originalitätsdruck ablenken zu lassen, haben wir eine Auswahl von zwanzig Titeln getroffen, die die außergewöhnliche Vielfalt und Vitalität spiegelt, mit der sich die deutschsprachige Literatur zumal in diesem Herbst präsentiert“, sagte Jury-Sprecherin Felicitas von Lovenberg, Redakteurin der Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung, am Mittwoch in Frankfurt.
Die nominierten Romane (in alphabetischer Reihenfolge der Autoren):
- Thommie Bayer: Eine kurze Geschichte vom Glück (Piper, August 2007)
- Larissa Boehning: Lichte Stoffe (Eichborn Berlin, August 2007)
- Julia Franck: Die Mittagsfrau (S. Fischer, September 2007)
- Thomas Glavinic: Das bin doch ich (Hanser, August 2007)
- Lena Gorelik: Hochzeit in Jerusalem (SchirmerGraf, März 2007, siehe: Gorelik, Lena: Hochzeit in Jerusalem)
- Sabine Gruber: Über Nacht (C.H. Beck, Januar 2007, siehe: Gruber, Sabine: Über Nacht)
- Peter Henisch: Eine sehr kleine Frau (Deuticke, August 2007)
- Michael Köhlmeier: Abendland (Hanser, August 2007)
- Katja Lange-Müller: Böse Schafe (Kiepenheuer & Witsch, August 2007)
- Michael Lentz: Pazifik Exil (S. Fischer, August 2007)
- Harald Martenstein: Heimweg (C. Bertelsmann, Februar 2007, siehe: Martenstein, Harald: Heimweg)
- Pierangelo Maset: Laura oder die Tücken der Kunst (kookbooks, September 2007)
- Robert Menasse: Don Juan de la Mancha (Suhrkamp, August 2007)
- Martin Mosebach: Der Mond und das Mädchen (Hanser, August 2007, siehe: Mosebach, Martin: Der Mond und das Mädchen und Online-Feature: Martin Mosebachs Roman „Der Mond und das Mädchen“)
- Mathias Nolte: Roula Rouge (Deuticke, März 2007)
- Gregor Sander: abwesend (Wallstein, März 2007, siehe: Sander, Gregor: Abwesend)
- Arnold Stadler: Komm, gehen wir (S. Fischer, Mai 2007, siehe: Stadler, Arnold: Komm, gehen wir)
- Peter Truschner: Die Träumer (Zsolnay, März 2007)
- John von Düffel: Beste Jahre (DuMont, August 2007)
- Thomas von Steinaecker: Wallner beginnt zu fliegen (FVA, Februar 2007, siehe: Junge Deutsche Literatur: Blut ist schicker als Wasser)
15. August 2007
Die Jury für den Deutschen Buchpreis 2007 hat 20 deutschsprachige Belletristik-Werke für die Auszeichnung nominiert. Der Preis ist mit insgesamt 37.500 Euro dotiert und wird zum dritten Mal vergeben. „Ohne uns von Prominenz verführen oder von Originalitätsdruck ablenken zu lassen, haben wir eine Auswahl von zwanzig Titeln getroffen, die die außergewöhnliche Vielfalt und Vitalität spiegelt, mit der sich die deutschsprachige Literatur zumal in diesem Herbst präsentiert“, sagte Jury-Sprecherin Felicitas von Lovenberg, Redakteurin der Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung, am Mittwoch in Frankfurt.
Die nominierten Romane (in alphabetischer Reihenfolge der Autoren):
- Thommie Bayer: Eine kurze Geschichte vom Glück (Piper, August 2007)
- Larissa Boehning: Lichte Stoffe (Eichborn Berlin, August 2007)
- Julia Franck: Die Mittagsfrau (S. Fischer, September 2007)
- Thomas Glavinic: Das bin doch ich (Hanser, August 2007)
- Lena Gorelik: Hochzeit in Jerusalem (SchirmerGraf, März 2007, siehe: Gorelik, Lena: Hochzeit in Jerusalem)
- Sabine Gruber: Über Nacht (C.H. Beck, Januar 2007, siehe: Gruber, Sabine: Über Nacht)
- Peter Henisch: Eine sehr kleine Frau (Deuticke, August 2007)
- Michael Köhlmeier: Abendland (Hanser, August 2007)
- Katja Lange-Müller: Böse Schafe (Kiepenheuer & Witsch, August 2007)
- Michael Lentz: Pazifik Exil (S. Fischer, August 2007)
- Harald Martenstein: Heimweg (C. Bertelsmann, Februar 2007, siehe: Martenstein, Harald: Heimweg)
- Pierangelo Maset: Laura oder die Tücken der Kunst (kookbooks, September 2007)
- Robert Menasse: Don Juan de la Mancha (Suhrkamp, August 2007)
- Martin Mosebach: Der Mond und das Mädchen (Hanser, August 2007, siehe: Mosebach, Martin: Der Mond und das Mädchen und Online-Feature: Martin Mosebachs Roman „Der Mond und das Mädchen“)
- Mathias Nolte: Roula Rouge (Deuticke, März 2007)
- Gregor Sander: abwesend (Wallstein, März 2007, siehe: Sander, Gregor: Abwesend)
- Arnold Stadler: Komm, gehen wir (S. Fischer, Mai 2007, siehe: Stadler, Arnold: Komm, gehen wir)
- Peter Truschner: Die Träumer (Zsolnay, März 2007)
- John von Düffel: Beste Jahre (DuMont, August 2007)
- Thomas von Steinaecker: Wallner beginnt zu fliegen (FVA, Februar 2007, siehe: Junge Deutsche Literatur: Blut ist schicker als Wasser)
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Wednesday, August 08, 2007
Sunday, August 05, 2007
Saturday, August 04, 2007
FT.com / World - Rising demand stirs Leipzig’s top properties
FT.com / World - Rising demand stirs Leipzig’s top properties
Rising demand stirs Leipzig’s top properties
By Hugh Williamson in Leipzig
Published: August 4 2007 05:20 | Last updated: August 4 2007 05:20
For the past decade Leipzig’s property market has been known for one thing: a surfeit of places to rent or buy.
Like many towns in eastern Germany, the region’s largest city outside Berlin experienced a large expansion in construction projects after German reunification.
The subsequent pricking of this largely artificial bubble in the late 1990s became synonymous with the economic mistakes made in Germany’s troubled unity process, as investors failed to materialise, generous tax breaks lapsed and financial instruments such as closed-end property funds lost their shine.
But in a sign that Germany’s recovery is reaching even such difficult economic corners, central Leipzig’s property market is stirring. Rental prices have risen as, for the first time in years, demand is again outstripping supply.
At present, it applies largely to “top-of-the-range office properties”, says Elke Engel, Leipzig director of Aengevelt, a real estate company. In the business heart of Leipzig’s old town, Ms Engel shows visitors around an elegant 300 square metre suite of lawyers’ offices with upmarket fittings and a view of the city’s skyline.
“This costs around €11.50 ($15.80, £7.80) per square metre, a very high rent for Leipzig,” if not for west German cities, she says. She adds: “And finding a new tenant [if the lawyers moved out] would be easy – demand is high.”
This contrasts with Leipzig’s bleak years, when top office rents fell from more than €20 per sq m in the early 1990s to below €10 per sq m in 1998.
Rents are also rising for standard office space, says Wolfgang Morenz of EPM Assetis, another Leipzig estate agent.
“Many companies want to move back into the city centre,” he says. The economic upswing also plays a role, he adds: “Companies accept the argument that, as the economy improves, rents go up,” noting that some rents are edging up from €6 per sq m to around €8 per sq m.
Yet in what property experts see as a “tale of two cities”, Leipzig’s pinch in supply of upmarket office property sits alongside a huge oversupply of less desirable older premises.
As much as 740,000 sq m of Leipzig’s office capacity remains empty – a huge 27 per cent share that tops vacancy rates across Germany.
Towards the outskirts of the city, Ms Engel shows another set of offices, this time gapingly empty, with cables hanging from the ceilings. There have been no tenants for more than two years.
She is convinced these premises will soon be rented but admits the offices – despite a price tag of €5 per sq m – have problems, including their location and the lack of modern underfloor cabling facilities.
Uwe Albrecht, Leipzig’s deputy mayor, says city authorities work with businesses and property companies to find appropriate office space, but ultimately it is the responsibility of investors and property owners to deal with empty premises. Market forces have the final say, he argues.
Tobias Just, a property analyst with Deutsche Bank Research, confirms that despite the vacant premises, Leipzig and eastern Germany as a whole are again becoming promising locations for property investors. But he warns of the risks, including the relative weakness of the eastern economy, including its services sector, and the lack of company headquarters in the region. “Ignoring these risks would be a mistake,” he says.
That view is shared by Christian Ullrich, a property expert at Leipzig’s chamber of commerce. He points out the city’s latest, ambitious construction project: three derelict blocks of offices and apartments that are to be replaced by an upmarket shopping centre.
Reflecting a worry that the flaws of the building boom in the 1990s could repeat themselves, he says: “I’m not sure there’s really the demand for more shopping space, especially selling luxury products. People in Leipzig are not very wealthy.”
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Rising demand stirs Leipzig’s top properties
By Hugh Williamson in Leipzig
Published: August 4 2007 05:20 | Last updated: August 4 2007 05:20
For the past decade Leipzig’s property market has been known for one thing: a surfeit of places to rent or buy.
Like many towns in eastern Germany, the region’s largest city outside Berlin experienced a large expansion in construction projects after German reunification.
The subsequent pricking of this largely artificial bubble in the late 1990s became synonymous with the economic mistakes made in Germany’s troubled unity process, as investors failed to materialise, generous tax breaks lapsed and financial instruments such as closed-end property funds lost their shine.
But in a sign that Germany’s recovery is reaching even such difficult economic corners, central Leipzig’s property market is stirring. Rental prices have risen as, for the first time in years, demand is again outstripping supply.
At present, it applies largely to “top-of-the-range office properties”, says Elke Engel, Leipzig director of Aengevelt, a real estate company. In the business heart of Leipzig’s old town, Ms Engel shows visitors around an elegant 300 square metre suite of lawyers’ offices with upmarket fittings and a view of the city’s skyline.
“This costs around €11.50 ($15.80, £7.80) per square metre, a very high rent for Leipzig,” if not for west German cities, she says. She adds: “And finding a new tenant [if the lawyers moved out] would be easy – demand is high.”
This contrasts with Leipzig’s bleak years, when top office rents fell from more than €20 per sq m in the early 1990s to below €10 per sq m in 1998.
Rents are also rising for standard office space, says Wolfgang Morenz of EPM Assetis, another Leipzig estate agent.
“Many companies want to move back into the city centre,” he says. The economic upswing also plays a role, he adds: “Companies accept the argument that, as the economy improves, rents go up,” noting that some rents are edging up from €6 per sq m to around €8 per sq m.
Yet in what property experts see as a “tale of two cities”, Leipzig’s pinch in supply of upmarket office property sits alongside a huge oversupply of less desirable older premises.
As much as 740,000 sq m of Leipzig’s office capacity remains empty – a huge 27 per cent share that tops vacancy rates across Germany.
Towards the outskirts of the city, Ms Engel shows another set of offices, this time gapingly empty, with cables hanging from the ceilings. There have been no tenants for more than two years.
She is convinced these premises will soon be rented but admits the offices – despite a price tag of €5 per sq m – have problems, including their location and the lack of modern underfloor cabling facilities.
Uwe Albrecht, Leipzig’s deputy mayor, says city authorities work with businesses and property companies to find appropriate office space, but ultimately it is the responsibility of investors and property owners to deal with empty premises. Market forces have the final say, he argues.
Tobias Just, a property analyst with Deutsche Bank Research, confirms that despite the vacant premises, Leipzig and eastern Germany as a whole are again becoming promising locations for property investors. But he warns of the risks, including the relative weakness of the eastern economy, including its services sector, and the lack of company headquarters in the region. “Ignoring these risks would be a mistake,” he says.
That view is shared by Christian Ullrich, a property expert at Leipzig’s chamber of commerce. He points out the city’s latest, ambitious construction project: three derelict blocks of offices and apartments that are to be replaced by an upmarket shopping centre.
Reflecting a worry that the flaws of the building boom in the 1990s could repeat themselves, he says: “I’m not sure there’s really the demand for more shopping space, especially selling luxury products. People in Leipzig are not very wealthy.”
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Friday, August 03, 2007
Saturday, July 28, 2007
FT.com / World - Germany’s tourists holiday at home
FT.com / World - Germany’s tourists holiday at home
Germany’s tourists holiday at home
By Hugh Williamson
Published: July 28 2007 06:33 | Last updated: July 28 2007 06:33
Wilfried Adolph, a pensioner from Dresden, is posing in the sun outside Sanssouci, a golden 18th century palace in Potsdam, near Berlin. “Germany is such a varied country, you don't need to go further away for a holiday” he says.
As the peak holiday season begins in Germany this weekend, many will share his view, and head not to airports but to the beaches, mountains and resorts their own country has to offer.
In a trend that is injecting new life into a €59bn domestic travel industry long seen as unadventurous and expensive, increasing numbers of Germans are choosing to holiday at home, attracted by offers, new hotels and restaurants, and better service.
Germany's economic recovery is also playing a role, says Birgit Freitag, spokeswoman for the tourism authority in Brandenburg, the region around Berlin where Sanssouci is located.
Over 90 per cent of Brandenburg's visitors are Germans, many of whom are keen on short holidays and long weekends, “especially now that people have a little more money in their pockets”.
The trend marks both continuity and change compared, for instance, with 20 years ago, according to the DZT, Germany’s tourism marketing agency. “Back then, many Germans took a fairly standard annual 3-to-4- week summer holiday at the seaside or in the Alps [in Germany], with few breaks in between,” a spokeswoman says.
Germans still take more holidays in Germany than in other individual destinations such as Spain and Italy. And the number of vacations taken within the country, as a percentage of all trips of four days or more, rose to 32 per cent last year from 29 per cent in 1999.
The increased enthusiasm for German holidays has been spurred by tour operators offering a growing variety of tailor-made holidays ranging from city breaks to “wellness” packages.
Environmental awareness about damaging carbon emissions from long-haul flights, and worries over terror attacks abroad, has also played a role in discouraging foreign trips.
And travel within the country has also increased since German reunification in 1990, which opened up new frontiers for Germans from both east and west.
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, a relatively poor coastal region in the former communist east, is now the country’s second most popular destination after Bavaria, offering sandy beaches, cycling and water sports.
Brandenburg, also in the former east, has been successful in attracting more German holiday-makers, by, for instance, combining city and countryside attractions, says Ms Freitag.
“We have 3,000 lakes and many rivers, and many western Germans like to hire boats to sail our waterways, and along the way stop in Berlin to see the sights,” she says.
Visitors to Brandenburg made about 8.8m overnight stays last year – up by 1.5m on 1996 – and the region is confident of breaking the 9m mark this year, she adds.
Detlef Naujokat, director of Ring Hotel am See, a 150-bed hotel in the Brandenburg countryside north of Berlin, says his hotel has expanded its spa and wellness area, which attracts both weekend guests and health enthusiasts.
“The improved economy is making a difference. People have more [financial] security, so are willing to spend more money on pampering themselves,” he says, noting that he has recently boosted his staff by four people to a total of 65.
Germany's appeal to its own population was helped by last year’s soccer world cup, when, to quote the DZT, “many Germans took a second, more positive look at their own country”.
Yet foreign trips, especially with budget airlines, remain popular too, so German operators need to keep on their toes, stresses Ms Freitag.
“Some parts of Brandenburg still do not have the best services for tourists,” she admits, acknowledging teething problems in eastern Germany’s embrace of the service culture.
Back at Sanssouci, it is the turn of Christina Müller, a 24-year-old woman from Hamburg, to pose in front of the palace.
She says she used to go on German holidays with her parents, but is now rediscovering the country – travelling this time with a friend from Austria.
“I also travel abroad, but having visits at home, especially these sorts of short trips to new places, can be fun too,” she says.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Germany’s tourists holiday at home
By Hugh Williamson
Published: July 28 2007 06:33 | Last updated: July 28 2007 06:33
Wilfried Adolph, a pensioner from Dresden, is posing in the sun outside Sanssouci, a golden 18th century palace in Potsdam, near Berlin. “Germany is such a varied country, you don't need to go further away for a holiday” he says.
As the peak holiday season begins in Germany this weekend, many will share his view, and head not to airports but to the beaches, mountains and resorts their own country has to offer.
In a trend that is injecting new life into a €59bn domestic travel industry long seen as unadventurous and expensive, increasing numbers of Germans are choosing to holiday at home, attracted by offers, new hotels and restaurants, and better service.
Germany's economic recovery is also playing a role, says Birgit Freitag, spokeswoman for the tourism authority in Brandenburg, the region around Berlin where Sanssouci is located.
Over 90 per cent of Brandenburg's visitors are Germans, many of whom are keen on short holidays and long weekends, “especially now that people have a little more money in their pockets”.
The trend marks both continuity and change compared, for instance, with 20 years ago, according to the DZT, Germany’s tourism marketing agency. “Back then, many Germans took a fairly standard annual 3-to-4- week summer holiday at the seaside or in the Alps [in Germany], with few breaks in between,” a spokeswoman says.
Germans still take more holidays in Germany than in other individual destinations such as Spain and Italy. And the number of vacations taken within the country, as a percentage of all trips of four days or more, rose to 32 per cent last year from 29 per cent in 1999.
The increased enthusiasm for German holidays has been spurred by tour operators offering a growing variety of tailor-made holidays ranging from city breaks to “wellness” packages.
Environmental awareness about damaging carbon emissions from long-haul flights, and worries over terror attacks abroad, has also played a role in discouraging foreign trips.
And travel within the country has also increased since German reunification in 1990, which opened up new frontiers for Germans from both east and west.
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, a relatively poor coastal region in the former communist east, is now the country’s second most popular destination after Bavaria, offering sandy beaches, cycling and water sports.
Brandenburg, also in the former east, has been successful in attracting more German holiday-makers, by, for instance, combining city and countryside attractions, says Ms Freitag.
“We have 3,000 lakes and many rivers, and many western Germans like to hire boats to sail our waterways, and along the way stop in Berlin to see the sights,” she says.
Visitors to Brandenburg made about 8.8m overnight stays last year – up by 1.5m on 1996 – and the region is confident of breaking the 9m mark this year, she adds.
Detlef Naujokat, director of Ring Hotel am See, a 150-bed hotel in the Brandenburg countryside north of Berlin, says his hotel has expanded its spa and wellness area, which attracts both weekend guests and health enthusiasts.
“The improved economy is making a difference. People have more [financial] security, so are willing to spend more money on pampering themselves,” he says, noting that he has recently boosted his staff by four people to a total of 65.
Germany's appeal to its own population was helped by last year’s soccer world cup, when, to quote the DZT, “many Germans took a second, more positive look at their own country”.
Yet foreign trips, especially with budget airlines, remain popular too, so German operators need to keep on their toes, stresses Ms Freitag.
“Some parts of Brandenburg still do not have the best services for tourists,” she admits, acknowledging teething problems in eastern Germany’s embrace of the service culture.
Back at Sanssouci, it is the turn of Christina Müller, a 24-year-old woman from Hamburg, to pose in front of the palace.
She says she used to go on German holidays with her parents, but is now rediscovering the country – travelling this time with a friend from Austria.
“I also travel abroad, but having visits at home, especially these sorts of short trips to new places, can be fun too,” she says.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Monday, July 09, 2007
FTD.de - Industrie - Nachrichten - Danone kauft niederländischen Konkurrenten
FTD.de - Industrie - Nachrichten - Danone kauft niederländischen Konkurrenten
Danone expandiert erneut: Der französische Lebensmittelkonzern will den niederländischen Milchkonzern Numico für 55 Euro je Aktie in bar übernehmen - das bedeutet einen Kaufpreis in zweistelliger Milliardenhöhe.
Danone expandiert erneut: Der französische Lebensmittelkonzern will den niederländischen Milchkonzern Numico für 55 Euro je Aktie in bar übernehmen - das bedeutet einen Kaufpreis in zweistelliger Milliardenhöhe.
Thursday, July 05, 2007
FTD.de - Handel + Dienstleister - Nachrichten - Bahn bietet weniger als vier Prozent
FTD.de - Handel + Dienstleister - Nachrichten - Bahn bietet weniger als vier Prozent
Die Deutsche Bahn will ihren Beschäftigten im Tarifstreit eine Erhöhung der Entgelte deutlich unter vier Prozent anbieten. Auch bei den Verhandlungen mit den Lokführern bleibt das Unternehmen hart: 31 Prozent mehr Lohn seien eine "völlig inakzeptable Forderung".
Die Deutsche Bahn will ihren Beschäftigten im Tarifstreit eine Erhöhung der Entgelte deutlich unter vier Prozent anbieten. Auch bei den Verhandlungen mit den Lokführern bleibt das Unternehmen hart: 31 Prozent mehr Lohn seien eine "völlig inakzeptable Forderung".
FTD.de - Autoindustrie - Nachrichten - Chinesen sind heiß auf Volkswagen
FTD.de - Autoindustrie - Nachrichten - Chinesen sind heiß auf Volkswagen
Der Volkswagen-Konzern hat in China im ersten Halbjahr so viele Autos verkauft wie noch nie zuvor. Die Marken Volkswagen, Skoda und Audi verzeichneten ein deutliches Plus. Neue Modelle sollen den Erfolg steigern.
Der Volkswagen-Konzern hat in China im ersten Halbjahr so viele Autos verkauft wie noch nie zuvor. Die Marken Volkswagen, Skoda und Audi verzeichneten ein deutliches Plus. Neue Modelle sollen den Erfolg steigern.
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