Germany - Poverty - Underclass

[Skybird]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...443075,00.html

the Social Democrat-aligned Friedrich Ebert Foundation released a study claiming that 6.5 million Germans live in poverty, without much prospect of improving their lot. That's 8 percent of all Germans. Disturbingly, that figure soars to 20 percent in the states that comprised the former East Germany. Those who fell below the poverty line in the study earned an average of just €424 per month. (...) In its report, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation placed the poverty line at €938 per month, less than 60 percent of the German average. (...) The study comes just a month after frustrated voters sent neo-Nazi politicians to a third German state legislature in the space of two years. The radical right has been rising in Germany along with unemployment -- a fact the Friedrich Ebert study alludes to with a reference to the poor's penchant for "authoritarian politics." (...) At the same time, though, the German underclass isn't just white: About 24 percent of all immigrants to Germany are poor. (...) the number of children in families that fall below the poverty line and receive social welfare payments has almost doubled since Hartz IV* was implemented in 2005. (...) The split between rich and poor has grown, too. The richest 10 percent of German households own a full 47 percent of the country's privately-held assets -- a rise of around 2 percent since 1998. Meanwhile, workers are falling behind in what they need to know in order to land a job. "Lack of training and long-term unemployment are extreme and typically German problems," (...) Members of the new underclass, says Frank Karl, lead author of the Friedrich-Ebert study, "feel like losers ... And the worst part is: When we ask whether they think their children will do any better, most of them say no."

* Hartz IV is the fourth phase of a program that has changed routines of the social welfare system and support for unemployed people. It was meant to motivate by increasing the pressure to accept job offers even if they were badly payed or were a work people did not want to pick, and it did so by - in parts very drastically - cutting fiancial aid. However, the part of the program that promised to offer better chances and more jobs - failed completely. People feel the pressure and the punishement, but not the promises for better chances and perspectives. Quite the opposite.

Since Hartz IV we have seen an immense increase in socalled 1 euro-Jobs (where those being supported by Hartz IV can work but receive only 1 Euro per hour - great basis for securing an existence) that were meant to get people into jobs in the hope that they will be taken over into regular jobs after some months once their employer has had this cheap tesing phase. However, a majoirty oc compnies has choosen to take a more capitalistic approach onto this part of the program: they accept to pay somebody only 1 Euro, and when he leaves (because he is not given a regular fee and secure job after several months) the just pick the next one. That way, even regular jobs becomes victims of the 1-Euro- jobs. Again, the politicieans have been naive enoiugh to think that the real big players in the industry and economy would play fair game - that many just would choose to exploit this obvious opportunity did not came to minds of our realistic polticians.

The irony, we had a comparable desaster roughly 7-8 years ago. Back then, of non-regular jobs that were picked by students, for example, there were around 150-180 thousand in Germany. Work was 10-20 hours per week, taxes could be avoided under certain circumstances (social insurcance as well), wages were around 9-13 D-Mark per hours. then came Schroeder with his SPD-interpretation social justice: they made social insurances for such jobs obligatory, nevertheless it was a fixed sum independent from the netto earning, so that people would pay into their future security (the money gets spend by the state in the same year and there are no reserves, so neither me nor anyone else will get a minimal pension from it - essentially the system is stealing money from unregular employees in a legalised modus vivendi.). For companies, the new model payed off well, and they did, what every polticians has rejected that it would happen: the scratched regular full time jobs nby the thousands, and replaced them with cheaper "mini-jobs" that produce lesser tax.income for the sate, does not helpt the individual to raise money for the future purpose of pensions, and killed jobs. the number of non-regular mini-jopbs exploded from 150 to over 750 thousand currently, tendency: raising.

I work in a mini-job myself, and additionally share one fifth of the incomes of small real estates my mother owns, which together gives me a monthly income of roughly 750-800 euros per month, of which netto around 350 euros is left after taxes and regular payments. By definition, I am "poor", but can live well because I do not pay regular rent (I live in my own appartment and only pay a monthly "Hausgeld" which is only one quarter of the previous rent), do not own a car, and have no children, family or a divorced ex-wife. If I would have to raise children, I would be a suicide-candidate. My future pension will be the full income from the real estates - I have no pension demands worth to be considered, and no life insurances or anything like that. So, all in all I call myself lucky, and can life on a reasonable modest, but fearless living standard.

but of the 78 people who studied in my semester, two years later a study by the Dekan of the university found that 31 of them had run into unemployment, never finding a job or gotten fired, with serious consequences for relationships with a partner and families. Over one third didn't make it.

The days of the glorious germa welfare system are long since gone. If outsiders mock about the German welfare as parasites sucking an naive communities lifeblood, I can only chuckle. From Berlin I know sicne years, from first hand (social worker I know personally from earlier times) that statistically every fifth child does not get one warm meal every three days at home, for the parents do not have the money, and that these kids are feeded by local initiaves and public kitchens.

It's becoming harsh and frosty over here - and for enough people that it can no longer be intentionally overseen.

And think about nthis - the economy takes things like minijobs and 1-Euro-Jobs for granted now, and think of it as regular jobs. If you want to correct this abuse in a couple of years - economical and job structures will already depend on these, so that you can'T remove them without doing damage.

The charm of globalisation. Will become much, much worse.