I essay a good bit about poverty in Germany, welfare, long-term unemployed, and the trend of political parties to continually be searching for some magic formula to fix all problems. There was a piece last night via Hart Aber Fair (ARD public TV) got caught my interest.
Focus (the German news magazine) very briefly touched on it this morning.
The chief pro-capitalism guest on the chat forum (Christoph Gröner, self-made wealthy German who did it via real estate)....bluntly said he doesn't want any more tax growth.....mostly because it's not achieving what politicians promise.
So he tossed this pretty radical idea onto the group. Since he and the other folks of wealth in Germany are contributing a huge chunk of the taxation money.....they want a right to say where the money goes.
You can imagine how the pro-socialism folks on the panel handled that. Immediately they said that would lead onto a oligarchy. In their mind....ONLY the government can make capable decisions.
Where does Groner, the capitalist, want the big chunk of money to go? Education. Yep, that was a shocker. For a long while, I've surveyed that idea and can believe that he might have a point.
I noticed about three months ago in Germany that some studies have been done with long-term unemployed Germans and the results go to this odd phonenum. The vast majority of these people don't have a certified craft or skill. They reached some point where their apprenticeship fell apart, and the system just dumped right there. Their only path ahead was some lousy clerk job....stocking shelves....bus-driver, or a zero-paht occupation. It's not the entire group of long-term employed, but it takes up a significant number.
In the case of all of these long-term unemployed folks, it would a major plus-up if the Job-Centers would just pick these people up.....put them through attitude adjustment training, and helped/forced them into an apprenticeship program.
If you get welfare....you ought to be required to show up at some warehouse in town with no TV or internet service....just chairs....and forced to sit there eight hours a day or agree to an apprenticeship training program.
The public watching the forum last night? I think they were curious about this idea of doing something different because it's obvious that the government's solutions aren't working.
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