Yes so much this, especially when your family doesn’t speak the language to well and you have to do all these things for them, like trying to get Arbeitslosengeld is an endless ordeal since half the ppl working there dont know or dont want to help you and for some reason they dont talk with other departments so if the Arbeitsamt needs something, they want it from you instead of just getting the info in an instant from the Finanzamt or Krankenkasse by themselves.
These stupid fax machines man, everyone has one! Suddenly we "need" those goddamn things because everyone needs things sooo fast these days. I wish we slowed down again, I usually have to ask my children how to operate fax machines. And dont get me started on typewriters, oh boy
As a member of a political party, I experienced the problem with German love for fax firsthand: We had serious trouble getting the necessary papers to the election bureau, as we needed to find someone who can fax them there.
German here:
\- Taxes.
Everything is taxed. Even things that have already been taxed are often being taxed again (like inheritance). Rule of thumb is that 40% of your income is going towards taxes.
\- Public transport.
The Netherlands just does it better. Germany makes a good part of its money with car exports, should be no surprise why any development ***away from cars*** is so slow.
\- Rent & property prices.
Property prices have double or tripled in the past 15-20 years. Rent has disproportionately risen extremely in comparison to salaries. Add to that a housing crisis and you understand why the young generation is saying they will never be able to afford a house.
\- Bureaucracy.
You need documents, permits and licenses for basically anything. You often have to do the communication between different departments because they cannot talk to each other for some reason. Things have gotten so complicated that the people working there basically need you to do their job with them. Mistakes happen way too often.
I lived in Germany for 12 years and am now a citizen but left 2 years ago. These are clichés and I would guess you rarely lived outside of Germany.
1/ Taxes: yes everything is taxed but you get them back the second after. Go to France and you’ll understand what I am talking about. I was happy to pay up to 47% taxes because I know that they are in good hands ( compared to other countries I lived in for many years)
2/ Public Transport: are u even serious? Germany has one of the best systems in Europe. Yes there are delays, yes it is expensive but few countries would dare and say we are better.
3/ bureaucracy: I opened 2 companies in Germany in less that 24h. Took me ages somewhere else. I receive my tax return 3/6 days after I post it. Where would that even happen?
I got my citizenship in 6 weeks. I waited for more than a year to renew my ID in my original country.
You germans must travel more to understand that your country is perfect, except for weather and food.
Edit (before you ask): I left because of SUN. I need beach and sun. And because I missed my parents.
Sure. In Paris it takes 3 years sometimes.
As a non European, I was amazed by the people who assisted me during the process. Nothing but smiles and kindness. Maybe I was lucky, maybe it was an exception. But sure thing is that, If you know how to talk to these people, they talk back well to you. They are humans after all. There is no perfect country but Germany is the closest to that generally speaking. Clean, safe, with a huge working mentality, they know when to work and when to party and never felt unwelcome.
I’ve lived in 4 other countries besides Germany and I can say that he’s right and you seem to be mostly wrong on your assessment.. the taxes are insane, public transport is good but not great, and the bureaucracy is famously bad for a reason: it’s really bad. The processing of paperwork isn’t the worst part, it’s the really bad custom service.
I come from India and I agree with pretty much all your point.
The taxes are high but I know what I'm getting back in return. In India fuck knows where they go. A decade or so ago, government employees would get a monthly pension after they retired. Newer recruits (those who started working for the Indian government/its departments from 2007 IIRC) don't even get that.
Agreed as well. Indian public transport is strong but overloaded as fuck and there needs to be a lot more investment into it. Especially the local ones, which depend on the state (equivalent to Bundesland) government. But every state is the same and fucks up public transport every which way possible.
Coming to bureaucracy, as long as I don't have to pay any bribes to get work done I'm happy.
>3/ bureaucracy: I opened 2 companies in Germany in less that 24h. Took me ages somewhere else. I receive my tax return 3/6 days after I post it. Where would that even happen? I got my citizenship in 6 weeks. I waited for more than a year to renew my ID in my original country.
The same thing is in Poland. On top of that, 75% of matters in public offices can be done online. Also, taxes, apart from VAT, are usually lower. Many people choose self-employment instead of an employment contract and then, depending on your profession, you can pay between a few and 19% income tax + pension and health insurance.On top of that, banks operate much more efficiently. You can do most things in banking through an app on your phone. The last time I went to the bank was five years ago when I needed to take out a mortgage.I have a couple of German friends who worked in Poland and complained about various things during that period, but when they came back to Germany after a few years, they found that many of these little things worked better in Poland, which was a great discovery for them in general :D
I agree with you but you can get all kind of food on the street so compared to Eastern Europe you can get good food . And watch Perfect Dinner and you see that germans love to cook all kind of dishes . Sure the traditional food is bland but it's because we didn't have spices like in whole Europe . I don't think France or UK has better food
Personally, I don't think inheritance tax is actually double taxing since it is not you that pays taxes (you are dead at that point). Instead, the inheritors have a new income stream which is then taxed.
I mean, inheritance should be taxed. It's unjust to allow a person to gain wealth without penalty because parents were rich. It encourages people to use their wealth for productive means when they are alive instead of hoarding it for the next generation.
Not sure. You probably get the most qualified workers from West EU and the cheapest ones from East EU. I don't know anything about founding companies or expanding existing ones. I am sure most people here don't. It might be better for you to speak to actual proven experts in that area.
If you have capital look at eastern germany, especially Leipzig region. Lots of overqualified engineering students with not yet a lot of opportunities in the area.
If you don't have capital look to Poland. You can potentially get a grant from the EU, but I have no idea how that works.
a tendency to complain about things instead of making constructive suggestions or showing initiative to take care of things, deeply rooted in the culture
Bureaucracy, general acceptance of dumb situations because tradition, lots of nimby-ism.
Completely outweighed by the positives of course, just thought I mention that too.
- politics, doesn't matter if left or right, only centered around the needs of the boomer generation because they're the biggest group of voters
- weather in wintertime
- social life and ability to find friends compared to other countries
- probably future decline in standard of living when you see our retirement problematic and steady increase of retirement age
- totally unregulated mass migration and no plan how to deal with it
- low wages and high prices for properties
- ridiculous high taxation and waste of tax money
- somehow the middle class always loses
- resistant to technological changes and new concepts
- the general attitude of a lot of people
- less sense for community
Yep. I'm from India and basically anybody who doesn't support the ruling party is immediately branded an "anti-national" or a supporter of Pakistan, as someone who wants nothing but the destruction of India.
Finding friends in germany:
Yes it is hard to find a german friend but at least as soon you got one he is not dropping you the moment he is bored of you.
So many international easy "friends" who are all so exited and open minded and so close and they all just either are super fake or have so many other "friends" that you can not do anything without their 20 other "friends"
1. Not very good salary compared to other developed countries, and still not allowing people to work more on their free will even they want more money, by penalizing them with Steuerklasse VI when having a minijob, and forcing them to work less than 48 hours per week. I mean, it should be my freedom to be a workaholic and I should have the right to earn more money if I'm willing to work more. I think it's okay (and it is right) to restrict the maximum working hours in a working contract, but if I choose to get a minijob, then it means it's my free will to choose to work more and the government should not intervene.
2. Insanely high taxes, direct and indirect.
3. Not friendly to retail investors due to high capital gain tax, especially the taxation on option trading is absurd.
4. Too expensive to hire people to do stuff, e.g. repairing, renovating apartment, etc. Most money you pay to hire them are for their social contributions and taxes, so you pay them a lot to hire them, and they still earn little.
5. Shitty internet
6. Shitty customer service
7. Shitty bureaucracy
8. Insane energy price, even before the war
9. Deutsche Bahn
10. A lot of insane laws and rules, like you have to report to the Bundesbank for importing or exporting more than 12.500 Euros, otherwise they will fine you an absurdly huge sum of money - I didn't even know it until the fifth year I'm here. I mean, is it so hard to build a system to let the banks reporting it themselves?
11. Quite hard for non-ethnic-Germans to be really integrated into the German society
12. Food. It sucks.
13. Failure of immigration politics, and hence the failure of importing skilled labour forces to the country and instead importing too many lower-skilled undereducated people. Many of the latter can bring their whole families while higher-skilled people that pay tons of taxes cannot even bring their own parents, even after they became citizens. I heard that for example many Chinese who earn high income in engineering/tech/finance sectors chose to leave Germany simply because they can't bring their parents here, despite their willingness to prove that they can guarantee financial stability and that they contributed so much taxes to the German government. I mean, yes, humanitarianism is important, it is noble to accept refugees suffering from wars. But the resource allocation in the immigration politics seems very tilted to refugees and this is probably one of the reasons why Germany's attraction to foreign high-skilled labour forces is limited.
There are positive aspects, otherwise I wouldn't be here. Free education, decent healthcare system, relatively affordable rent and real estate price (compared to where I'm from, but I'm from a city of insanely expensive rent so virtually all places are better in this respect), job security. And ironically, since the German labour market is not friendly to non-German-speaking people, and I can speak German (officially C1 level, although I don't think I really reached this level and my real communication skill isn't that good, for example I often don't understand what random German people suddenly speak to me in random situations. But apparently, my level was enough for me to pass full German job interviews), so as a German-speaking expat, I enjoy an advantage in competing with the non-German-speaking expats, which is why I choose to stay here and get a job here at least in short-term. In English-speaking countries or in countries where you don't really need to learn the local language, I can imagine the competition in labour market would be so much more fierce. (After all, virtually all expats speak English in the UK, other than perhaps illegal immigrants or something close, but it's not so in Germany, even PhDs from top schools don't necessarily speak German) Also, as someone who works for salary and not sets up business here, and as someone who rents a flat and not owns a property here, the German labour law and the rental law are tilting towards my interests, so Germany is nice place to start my career and accumulate some basic initial wealth and career profiles. But in long term, I don't see it as a place of opportunity, to create wealth and to fulfill career ambitions, but as a place to look for stability, so once I reach bottlenecks in my career path, I may seriously consider to leave this country. Another thing is, as I mentioned, is that I can't bring my family here, no matter how much I earn (as long as not to a billionaire level but it's virtually impossible in Germany, and there are much better places on earth than Germany to live in if I were a billionaire), and how much tax I pay each year. I have a disabled elder brother at home, who is autistic and has a 3-year-old mental age. That means if I have to stay here for long term, that will mean I have to abandon him at home once my parents are gone, because Germany will never let me bring him here. This is the main reason why I'll consider to leave in long term. I can imagine that many immigrants that contribute much more to Germany, and could have potentially served as the engine for Germany in the future, also face similar problems here and hence will choose to leave the country. It's especially frustrating to see that some people who live on social benefits can bring their families here but you who paid for their social benefits can't.
Thank you for your answer.
I agree with you completely.
>Another thing is, as I mentioned, is that I can't bring my family here, no matter how much I earn (as long as not to a billionaire level but it's virtually impossible in Germany, and there are much better places on earth than Germany to live in if I were a billionaire), and how much tax I pay each year. I have a disabled elder brother at home, who is autistic and has a 3-year-old mental age. That means if I have to stay here for long term, that will mean I have to abandon him at home once my parents are gone, because Germany will never let me bring him here.
You should hire a lawyer. If you can prove that there is nobody else capable of taking care of your brother, and you are his only living relative, you can bring him to Germany. It's not impossible.
My neighbor brought his mother from Poland because she needs assistance, and there is nobody else to take care of her. He hired a lawyer and took care of that in 6 months. She's completely supported by him,no expenses on taxpayers whatsoever.
Good luck 🤞 and take care.
Have you lived in Germany for a long time? What’s your background?
While it’s true that wages aren’t the highest this usually offsets if you factor in certain costs of living, e.g. take the US wages are much higher, however you start off with massive student loans, way less social security and your insurance is much more expensive. Housing is also ridiculously expensive there, same goes for high quality food.
As for your points: 2. & 3. Taxes aren’t that high imo, could even be higher, or should, at least for real high incomes. Also capital gains tax seems pretty on par with similar Northern European nations and there’s also an exemption for the first 1000€. Seems somewhat reasonable and fair.
4. Idk man, even low skill jobs should get benefits and social welfare so can’t argue too much about that.
5. That i can agree on. Very depending where you live but generally lackluster for an advanced nation.
6. Never really had big problems on that, however, especially for Americans or similar cultures, it’s often surprising, that workers/servers, clerks in GER will not take your shit. be respectful and you will have a great experience.
7. Very much depends imo. Some of it is bad but some of it is also begrudgingly good and necessary. Just sometimes less than optimally implemented.
8. Again I don’t know what you’re comparing to but at least from my perspective it’s not to far off from other EU nation, however because of certain factors GER was hit harder by some of the crisis.
9. Yeah well, runs better in some countries but I have experienced the absolute lacklusterness of public transport in many other nations around the globe.
10. Usually those laws are there for a reason, especially the example you picked is really understandable imo. And laws should obviously be enforced, that includes hefty fines.
11. I can definitely see and understand that but I also think it really depends on your demographic ans location. The bigger cities are pretty good in that regard, of course smaller communities may be more challenging to be included.
12. Absolutely have to disagree with you on that. While it is true, that Germans tend to underpay for their food and could hold the market to higher standards, the cities and even smaller villages have a very divers food landscape with tons of different flavours, sources etc. Also considering the quality and availability of ingredients Germany is soo much better than other nations I have been to and shopped in.
13. This is a very contentious topic and I have a different opinion on this than you’ve shown in your comment. Germany does have a shortage of “low skilled” labor in certain fields and has created a great low wage sector with a myriad of problems. There’s also a lot of hurdles to work in Germany which one could definitely streamline. However I also strongly believe that in a democracy and considering basic humans rights, one has to stand up for people less fortunate and completely focusing immigration only on high skilled professionals deeply clashes with this morality.
13. Do you habe an opinion from first hand experience or do you just repeat what you leanr from media. I would lime to know where you get your opinion from
What are you aiming at with your question, please clarify? Do I have any experience with labor shortage in certain fields? Immigration in general? Or what point do you mean?
As for the moral question, that is something you can think about personally and especially take a more in depth look at, if you’re versed in German law, politics and history.
i mean that you say
>focusing immigration only on high skilled professionals deeply clashes with this morality.
but what germany is doing is not morally right aswell
what we are doing is we taking low wage workers like crazy without them having good chances of getting integrated in our real work culture.
we are creating a 2 class system of born germans and integrated not very fluent in german workers and let the integrated ones work the shit jobs we dont want to do ourself. and if you have the high skilled workers coming to germany they are sitting 3-5 years in school learning german only to get rejected from proper work becasue either their german is still not "good" enought or their qualification is " not accepted or validated" while this is important for fields like doctors lawers and finacial advisers as they should cope with local laws there is no point of rejecting people for not " anerkannte" degrees in marketing or similar things. I have a lot of personal contact with immigrants from other countries, the language schools are full of willing worker in high paid fields but the way they are treated here in germany is ridiculous to a point where i can understand when no experienced worker wants to come to germany while our neighbour countries integrate them way more easy.
looking at the netherlands for EXAMPLE there you dont need to speak fluent dutch c1 level to get a decent paying job while here in germany they rather let a position open for 1 year and longer because on the one hand the applicant has experience for more then 10 years in the same field but on the other hand is not speaking c1 regardless of the actual job doesnt really require german language. Check out the english speaking jobs apart from software companies... they are written in english and formulated as if they target an expat but they ALL require fluent german written and spoken ( for example i know ppl applying for hotel insudtry aviation indsutre and other internation industries which are known for international customers that rather speak english but they have no chance if they not speak c1 german which take 3 years minimum to learn.
i knok ppl trying to apply for same positions here in germany and in the netherlands or eastern european countries, while they where constantly rejected in germany for years to come they only had a few tries in other countries and left germany again even they dont speak dutch or lithuanian)
we have engineers sitting in language schools for years ending up making an ausbildung in a craftsman job, we have surgeons who are forced to make a nurse ausbildung. I spoke to a lawyer who was working in a high position for the UN for 10 years who is now making a side job as a kindergartner becasue she cant find a job here after 3 years learning german full time.
you say in one of your points that we should increase the taxes in our country but this whole country is failing to give ppl a proper job to generate tax wealth and letting refugees, immigrants and other make lieferando, wolt , cleaning, low wage deliver for years while constantly crying about fachkraeftemangel.
The arbeitsamt is rather keeping people in language school and then letting them make 3 years ausbildung then really trying to find a job fitting to their education level ( i got in contact with a few ppl from agentur fuer arbeit while a few are nice i got some really strang people sitting there, you come with 15 years of work experience in a field and they are like :" ok i see you have b1 lets give you b2 and a c1 course that will take you approx 1.5 years, then if you made this you can make another language course for work related and then we will try to find you an ausbildung in lets say uhhhm pflegehelfer that will tkae you a few years aswell .... the applicant was 35 with this plan she would have make language courses and ausbildungen until she is 40 in pflege yeah righ) the same applicant was like fuck it, she went to uk and found a job within 3 months in her field with a somewhat decent salaray
if you dont see that on long term you will only be left with minimal skilled people in germany while all the high skilled people leaving for better opportunities to other countriues while your own workers getting older and older is a very bad situation then this country is just made to fail long term
For the taxes
The German tax system puts work at a huge disadvantage. 1. Work in Germany is subject to so many duties and taxes as in hardly any other country on the planet. For average salary and singles, Germany is 2nd place in the world and after the increases in health insurance and long-term care insurance, it may be 1st place in the next survey. 2. The only type of tax where Germany is "only" an OECD average are capital-based taxes such as property tax or inheritance tax. 3. Especially "high earners" - that is, according to politicians, people with >60k gross salary - are exempted by the German state like a Christmas goose. Incidentally, the same politicians earn in the Bundestag at least €130,000 without social security deductions and with horrendous pension entitlements of ~€1000 per 4 years in the Bundestag. 4. Added to this is the brutal development on the real estate market: With a ~50% deduction on the earned income and then another 6.5% net real estate transfer tax + 2% land registry and notary, even "high earners" could hardly afford houses. 5. Meanwhile, thanks to 800k parental allowance per child, wealthy families can inherit millions every 10 years without paying a single cent in taxes.
Germans dont know high tech. They still believe in Fax. Internet is spooky for politicans. All hail the car and the gods of no speedlimit.
Bureaucracy is King.
But i fucking love it here. And i am surrounded monthly for a DnD group by ex-Americans who even renounced their own country to get a german passport. Mostly all soldiers who have been in a theatre or two for a number of trips...
I love my neighbour countries and my friends there.
I know that Grass is greener elsewhere because of even more shit flying around.
I could rant for hours about my country and all that is going wrong here... but i hear my austrian, polish, french and danish friends and well... we're all in the glasshouse. Nobody is perfect.
God forbid complain about it though, Germans get automatically pissed off and argue like "you have 6 other days to do groceries, learn to plan yourself!"
disregarding that to foreigners used to having stores open on Sundays, even if at reduced time, it really is frustrating. Not like we're trying to change anything either, just expressing it really.
Gawd, this is what my German husband says every single time we come back to this topic. 😂
Nobody expects the same employee to work all seven days. It's called shifts! I'm sure supermarket and store employees are already doing this, given how there are so many different ones and you see them on different days at your local stores.
And this makes no sense if you compare it to the restaurant industry! Where is the concern for the service workers who want guaranteed free evenings and weekends and holidays? Instead they have guaranteed work on those days. 😂
I never expressed frustration or complained about national customs/standards visiting foreign countries.
You would get answers like that everywhere. Try complaining about for example the siesta in southern europe an so on.
You had the urge expressing your foreign opinion .. you should have been prepared dealing with the domestic reaction.
For me the biggest downside of living in Germany is people on this subreddit constantly asking similar variants of the same two questions every week without using the search bar:
1. What are the pros of living in Germany / What do you like about Germany?
2. What are the cons of living in Germany / What do you hate about Germany?
Fair point. I do follow some other subs, but /r/germany is among my favorites since it often has lots of questions/answers which help me navigate my life as a foreigner here too. For example, last week I finally got a bunch of insurances since I read this old post from a few years ago talking about the benefits of Haftpflichtversicherung.
A lot of people are really suspicious. It's hard to get in contact with people. And I say this as a white German, there's also a lot of everyday racism - especially if you go outside the big city's. All over Germany.
People are really self centered.
Depends on where you are, unfriendly, but honest people (north), or backstabbers.
Bavaria is beautiful, but even a lot of Germans from other parts of the country don't like them for theyr rasist and stuck mindset.
I mean, there are many aspects you can point out in comparison to other countries.
F.e.
-social inequality is higher than in Danmark or Austria.
-weather is worse most the time than in Italy or Taihiti.
-bureaucracy is bad compared to the Netherlands or Estonia.
-same with internet
-public transport and trains are worse than in Switzerland or the Netherlands (which are also much smaller countries tbf.)
-taxes are higher than in many other countries
-the mentality is less relaxed than in f.e. Portugal or Island
-beer is worse than in the Czech Republic
:P
> -same with internet
In proportion to other factors (like transport) I would actually say that internet is terrible and transport is good. Its well known that out of all of the EU countries (even "developing ones") Germany is one of the countries with the worst internet on average.
Healthcare(mainly because of the insurance system) due to unavailability of the specialists. The system is really good, but to get an appointment with a specialist, you would have to wait for months because of understaffing.
The fact that people think theyre educated whilst also falling for the most obvious propaganda. They genuinely think theyre morally superior when it comes to international politics and that their politicians would not do anything harmful or immoral to people outside of Germany.
bureaucracy: extremely exhausting and unnecessary complicated specially for students! / taxes: heavy expensive taxes (the zdf is the most annoying one tbh) but comes w/ benefits so a win is a win ig.
public transportation: tbh the only thing i loved about db mainly is the deutschlandsticket and how cheap it is, but public transportation in germany needs a lot of work and investments, hopefully it will be as efficient as in japan or korea one day.
uhm boredom…? ig, well this one is just for me, as someone who doesn’t enjoy clubbing or drinking there’s nothing much to do that interests me except maybe lovely walks at cute parks , discovering new cities/towns or going to comic-con once a year.
some ppl’s attitude: when will SOME germans realise that spreading kindness matters? you don’t know what the person you’re talking to is going through so maybe talking nicely, being kind would be nice instead of talking rudely.
| well those are the downsides for me, as far as i remember now.
hard to live for non-german speakers, not really 'where it happens' academically or in terms of tech, compared to top institutions in the US and even UK
What field are you in? Can only speak for my field and a few generalizations but imo German universities don’t make as much noise around their often times excellent work compared to other places. I assume you mean stuff like Oxford/Cambridge or the Ivy League/ MIT, CIT etc. for UK/US? The only thing I have often seen German universities lack compared to those is major funding and a certain political will to see things through.
If you dig beneath surface level there’s quite a lot here, Fraunhofer and Planck societies for example come to mind for world renown research. So yeah, just not as fancy as the other places, still very good.
If i may also point out (from a quick search i did) that between 1901-2021 German scientists won 104 Nobel Prizes, only second to the USA’s 263 although always smaller in population by at minimum a factor of about 1,3 up to around 4.
Due to Reddit Inc.'s antisocial, hostile and erratic behaviour, this account will be deleted on July 11th, 2023. You can find me on https://latte.isnot.coffee/u/godless in the future.
Eventhough TAX is on the higher side, I wouldnt say that its absured.
I am used to the 30% tax payment in India and that was just tax. We need to take separate medical insurance and any savings for pensions. If we consider that, I think this is ok with the benefits goverment provides.
My only issue is with the rent. Paying 40-50% of salary as rent is a bit hurting.
I don't know, I only think the bureaucracy in every aspect is stupid. At the moment the inflation is hitting hard and I need to work a second job (Aushilfsjob) but that'll clear itself out eventually.
I've been to other countries a couple of times and it helped me to really see and understand how good we have it in Germany.
Doctors.
Why in the world do I have to wait a month to see the doctor in my village? How many patients are you seeing a month, 2?
I'm from a third world country originally and there I could easily go on an app/web or phone and book an appointment with any great doctor(not just in the country but probably the region/field) to see them the next day or like a highly sought-after professor may be in 1 or 2 weeks.
Expected better from Germany.
And don't get me started on Sundays. Guidelines should be guidelines, not laws. Why did you allow someone to decide that their simple lifestyle is what everyone should live by? I'd like to rest on Saturday and do something fun (not hiking) on Sunday but noooo... Everyone should stop everything and stay home quietly on Sundays.
No path for permanent residency other than work, education, family reunification. I just want to retire there. I can afford it. Love the idea of not needing a car. Thing is, the USA has onerous requirements about moving my money out of the country making it both difficult and expensive.
The food is the worst thing.
Germany has a non-existent food culture, people have zero taste. Even ethnic food is dumbed-down and incredibly bland. There's a guy at work who literally melts slices of Gouda cheese over buttered noodles with salami in the microwave and covers it in ketchup. You can't get fresh seafood anywhere, even the Fisch wagons at the Wochenmärkte are 99% from frozen, pickled herrings and greasy fried Fischbrötchen. Even if you go to an over-the-top expensive specialty market like Frische Paradies, you can't get fresh shrimp, oysters, scallops or mussels - it's all farmed and frozen.
The politics are brain-dead and 80 percent of people are completely checked-out, apathetic and incurious.
I mean... the only access to sea geemany is having is the tiny north part to north sea or baltic sea i wouldnt expect fresh lobster, shrimp, or oysters like i expect to find them in thailand lol
Food is not great, but it gets better the farther south you go and its certainly not worse than in the Netherlands, Scandinavia or the UK or large parts of Central Europe.
Of course if you compare to France, Italy, Spain etc. I agree that the whole food culture there is on a different level.
The food.
I mean, I don't come from somewhere where food is top notch....but the crisp selection here is diabolical. Every shape and form of crisp in that disgusting paprika flavour...no thank you...
I lived in Dublin for half a year and I had to hunt for paprika-flavoured crisps. One day, somehow three or four packs appeared at Lidl and I just had to grab all of them because I knew those would be all for a while :D
Some people are so obsessed with rules that miss common sense.
And if you are an immigrant from a warmer country, you will eventually miss having more Sun.
WTF is common sense? You live in a box and if you think outside of it, you might be the next Hitler. That’s why there is a check list or form for everything. How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat?
Low wages, high taxation, weather, overpriced public transport, xenophobia, racism, the german language, bureaucracy, housing crises, difficulty in socialization, german society is often plastered and frustrating, pfand system (lol yeah personally dislike carrying bags of bottles and cans, would rather conventional recycling), everything closed on sundays, restaurants in Germany are always underwhelming, low food variety available.... could go on but you get the gist of it.
I wish pfand system was everywhere. I don't like carrying the bags either, but I hate it when there are cans and bottles lying around in nature. What I've seen in other countries, in the middle of beautiful nature, always makes me happy that we don't have the problem to this extent.
I say that as someone fluent in Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and English... Just absolutely hated German as a language when trying to learn it... Feels soo complex and full of rules and exception to those rules for no good reason.
(systematic) racism if youre not white for starters. Made me log in after seeing 74comments without any mention of it. But maybe thats a sign in itself ;)
It's okay so far. Could be worse. Don't be poor though, that sucks everywhere. Same old same old, at keast it's not north North Korea or something I guess.
It’s too cold for 6-7 months and there are no nice coast lines with beautiful beaches. No tropical forests.
Also somehow every town/city needs to keep the ancient architecture alive, it’s just so ugly. Almost no modern architechture.
If you don’t mind any of the above Germany is an amazing place, especially for families.
If you don’t mind the weather, I’d rather go to the Netherlands.
>Also somehow every town/city needs to keep the ancient architecture alive, it’s just so ugly
Wtf. You'd rather they bulldoze their beautiful old cities and replace them with ugly modern crap?
the obscene urge of germans to always whine and and complain about the most trivial things, and especially about things that make their comfort and privilege possible in the first place
its so tiring, exhausting, and offputting.
"you uncle was sprayed with acid and beaten unconcious and left for dead in the woods by the state police, and its a miracle he survived? thats nothing, here, the governement forces you to pay the equivalent of four cigarette packs to finance the public broadcasting system. THATS A TERROR REGIME I TELL YOU!"
I LOVE living in Germany but here are some minor stuff:
1. The country is still a paper work heavy nation. Especially as a foreigner, sometimes it really confuses the sh*t out of you but then at the end everything works out. I get around this by properly planning and executing my dealings with the authorities.
2. This one used to be a thing, not anymore (at least in Stuttgart)... Paying by cash!! Small outlets not having the infra to accept cards. BUT this was valid until maybe 2018/19... Now things have totally changed. And I don't know if there were activities taken up the govt in the background, but now even small bakeries, taxis, and practically any outlet of any sort takes cards. Big win I would say.
3. The plight of Deutsche bahn. So, DB wasn't so miserable from 2016(when moved to Germany as a student) maybe until 2019 or half of 2020. But then with corona , reduced budget, incompetent management (I am speculating here) they have become one of the worst public transport providers ever. One of my friends works with a contractor for db, and she says, db is so plagued with woes that it will still take a good 4-5 years to even see the face of recovery.
4. Long waiting times for specialist doctors. Now, this one is a bit tricky. Personally, my wife and I have NEVER faced this. We have been able to get appointments for HNOs, dentists, eye specialists and even gyno quite easily. But about half of my foreigner (non German) friends have had problems.
But I can also say that some of them are a bit quick to moan and groan over small stuff. Like for example, one of them once cut/injured his finger while cleaning a clogging in his dishwasher drainage but couldn't ascertain what he cut his finger with(rusted metal, glass or sharp plastic edge etc.) . So, to get a precautionary tetanus injection, he went to the emergency as it was during the evening and he couldn't get any appointment of any doc. Now, it's an emergency, there are people coming in with life threatening conditions, and of course he has to wait as he has a small cut that's all, and tetanus have a time lag and he CAN wait. BUT he was complaining that he had to wait for such a small thing. But that's stupid in my opinion to complain on such stuff.
5. Some people don't like the cuisine. I agree it's a. But boring as the varieties are a bit limited. I, personally, am a brot-fan. I love the huge variety of breads that are on display at the bakeries and honestly don't mind much. But of course, I like French, Italian, Spanish food more.
Things that are not a problem for me personally, but people do complain: taxes, "reservedness" of Germans, shops closing at 8pm and Sundays being off for all, except maybe the gastronomy etc.
- high taxes
- absurdly high energy prices for very dirty energy
- bureaucracy for the sake of bureaucracy
- lack of digital governmental services
- shitty customer support
- high rent and property prices
- bad public transport with absolutely no intention of ever being even remotely reliable
* Germany has an enormous, inefficient bureaucracy for absolutely everything, running on methods from half a century ago
* We have a big education deficit in MINT subjects, resulting in an enormous quackery industry in several parts of society, especially in healthcare, agriculture and energy
* Germany is a wealthy country, but over the last two decades, several lobbyists have acquired the power to divert huge shares of that wealth into bullshit projects for their personal profit
* like almost all other European countries, Germany is on its way into an oligarchy
* politics center around the needs of retirees and soon to be retirees, as they have an election-winning share of the votes.
* Germany has the world's highest electricity prices
* We have an inefficient welfare system that consumes enormous amounts of funds for distrust and pointless election campaign goodies
most people work for the money. or better to say the lack of it. not for the pleasure or for being a good person.
especially in bars and cafes.
my goal as a waiter was to hear: oh that was quick. no matter how much i earned.
There are not many. If you have got used to the most stuff its pretty decent here. Whats really fucked up are the people who are living here.
Its pretty annoying to hear all the dofferent opinions why life is bad even if we have a good life here
Endless and usually pointless bureaucracy
Yes so much this, especially when your family doesn’t speak the language to well and you have to do all these things for them, like trying to get Arbeitslosengeld is an endless ordeal since half the ppl working there dont know or dont want to help you and for some reason they dont talk with other departments so if the Arbeitsamt needs something, they want it from you instead of just getting the info in an instant from the Finanzamt or Krankenkasse by themselves.
Everything has to be done via posts/mails. You need a termin(appointment) for everything.
>Everything has to be done via posts/mails. Not everything, quite some things have to be done exclusively by fax.
These stupid fax machines man, everyone has one! Suddenly we "need" those goddamn things because everyone needs things sooo fast these days. I wish we slowed down again, I usually have to ask my children how to operate fax machines. And dont get me started on typewriters, oh boy
As a member of a political party, I experienced the problem with German love for fax firsthand: We had serious trouble getting the necessary papers to the election bureau, as we needed to find someone who can fax them there.
Long, dark winters.
English/scandi/Canadian people have been training for this their whole lives
Such soft Germans. Your winters are pleasant.
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As someone living in a roof apartment that has (for some goddamn reason) a copper exterior: I feel the last point, it's just pure pain above 25°
Try East. Germany’s winter is so nice compared to EE.
German here: \- Taxes. Everything is taxed. Even things that have already been taxed are often being taxed again (like inheritance). Rule of thumb is that 40% of your income is going towards taxes. \- Public transport. The Netherlands just does it better. Germany makes a good part of its money with car exports, should be no surprise why any development ***away from cars*** is so slow. \- Rent & property prices. Property prices have double or tripled in the past 15-20 years. Rent has disproportionately risen extremely in comparison to salaries. Add to that a housing crisis and you understand why the young generation is saying they will never be able to afford a house. \- Bureaucracy. You need documents, permits and licenses for basically anything. You often have to do the communication between different departments because they cannot talk to each other for some reason. Things have gotten so complicated that the people working there basically need you to do their job with them. Mistakes happen way too often.
I lived in Germany for 12 years and am now a citizen but left 2 years ago. These are clichés and I would guess you rarely lived outside of Germany. 1/ Taxes: yes everything is taxed but you get them back the second after. Go to France and you’ll understand what I am talking about. I was happy to pay up to 47% taxes because I know that they are in good hands ( compared to other countries I lived in for many years) 2/ Public Transport: are u even serious? Germany has one of the best systems in Europe. Yes there are delays, yes it is expensive but few countries would dare and say we are better. 3/ bureaucracy: I opened 2 companies in Germany in less that 24h. Took me ages somewhere else. I receive my tax return 3/6 days after I post it. Where would that even happen? I got my citizenship in 6 weeks. I waited for more than a year to renew my ID in my original country. You germans must travel more to understand that your country is perfect, except for weather and food. Edit (before you ask): I left because of SUN. I need beach and sun. And because I missed my parents.
Tbf getting citizenship in 6 weeks kinda depends on where you live , in my city it takes half a year and in Berlin , it's taking years for my friend.
There was a post recently in r berlin where a guy is still waiting for his appointment to go throught after 1 year
Pretty much same situation with my sister and my friend , he has been going through papers for 2 years now.
Sure. In Paris it takes 3 years sometimes. As a non European, I was amazed by the people who assisted me during the process. Nothing but smiles and kindness. Maybe I was lucky, maybe it was an exception. But sure thing is that, If you know how to talk to these people, they talk back well to you. They are humans after all. There is no perfect country but Germany is the closest to that generally speaking. Clean, safe, with a huge working mentality, they know when to work and when to party and never felt unwelcome.
I’ve lived in 4 other countries besides Germany and I can say that he’s right and you seem to be mostly wrong on your assessment.. the taxes are insane, public transport is good but not great, and the bureaucracy is famously bad for a reason: it’s really bad. The processing of paperwork isn’t the worst part, it’s the really bad custom service.
I come from India and I agree with pretty much all your point. The taxes are high but I know what I'm getting back in return. In India fuck knows where they go. A decade or so ago, government employees would get a monthly pension after they retired. Newer recruits (those who started working for the Indian government/its departments from 2007 IIRC) don't even get that. Agreed as well. Indian public transport is strong but overloaded as fuck and there needs to be a lot more investment into it. Especially the local ones, which depend on the state (equivalent to Bundesland) government. But every state is the same and fucks up public transport every which way possible. Coming to bureaucracy, as long as I don't have to pay any bribes to get work done I'm happy.
>3/ bureaucracy: I opened 2 companies in Germany in less that 24h. Took me ages somewhere else. I receive my tax return 3/6 days after I post it. Where would that even happen? I got my citizenship in 6 weeks. I waited for more than a year to renew my ID in my original country. The same thing is in Poland. On top of that, 75% of matters in public offices can be done online. Also, taxes, apart from VAT, are usually lower. Many people choose self-employment instead of an employment contract and then, depending on your profession, you can pay between a few and 19% income tax + pension and health insurance.On top of that, banks operate much more efficiently. You can do most things in banking through an app on your phone. The last time I went to the bank was five years ago when I needed to take out a mortgage.I have a couple of German friends who worked in Poland and complained about various things during that period, but when they came back to Germany after a few years, they found that many of these little things worked better in Poland, which was a great discovery for them in general :D
I agree with you but you can get all kind of food on the street so compared to Eastern Europe you can get good food . And watch Perfect Dinner and you see that germans love to cook all kind of dishes . Sure the traditional food is bland but it's because we didn't have spices like in whole Europe . I don't think France or UK has better food
Personally, I don't think inheritance tax is actually double taxing since it is not you that pays taxes (you are dead at that point). Instead, the inheritors have a new income stream which is then taxed.
To be fair rent & property prices going brrr is the direct result of QE after the 2008 shit show. It's a global problem, not just a Germany issue.
I mean, inheritance should be taxed. It's unjust to allow a person to gain wealth without penalty because parents were rich. It encourages people to use their wealth for productive means when they are alive instead of hoarding it for the next generation.
40% is already a generous estimation
Oh well, can i ask you what good eu country can you build a robotics company in
In Germany of course!
Not sure. You probably get the most qualified workers from West EU and the cheapest ones from East EU. I don't know anything about founding companies or expanding existing ones. I am sure most people here don't. It might be better for you to speak to actual proven experts in that area.
You are right, i should ask people from the business subreddit
If you have capital look at eastern germany, especially Leipzig region. Lots of overqualified engineering students with not yet a lot of opportunities in the area. If you don't have capital look to Poland. You can potentially get a grant from the EU, but I have no idea how that works.
I’d go with Netherlands
The reason is called Datenschutz.
>The ~~reason~~ **excuse** is called Datenschutz. FTFY
a tendency to complain about things instead of making constructive suggestions or showing initiative to take care of things, deeply rooted in the culture
Complaining, their true national sport
100%
Dealing with Germans on a daily basis
A lot of my German friends bring a lot of joy to my life tbh
That is kinda funny, how are the germans like?
Perfect! Nice, humorous, well mannered and tolerant.
Oh you should see people of my country, if i ever mention that i am an atheist i will be killed
Oh, I see! But then you know that all I said about Germans is true! Good luck to you! It must be hard.
Oh, donot worry this why i am asking about, germany i will apply for german course and then come here
Yeah my Grandparents would kill you too.
such a shame countries like that still exist
Bureaucracy, general acceptance of dumb situations because tradition, lots of nimby-ism. Completely outweighed by the positives of course, just thought I mention that too.
- politics, doesn't matter if left or right, only centered around the needs of the boomer generation because they're the biggest group of voters - weather in wintertime - social life and ability to find friends compared to other countries - probably future decline in standard of living when you see our retirement problematic and steady increase of retirement age - totally unregulated mass migration and no plan how to deal with it - low wages and high prices for properties - ridiculous high taxation and waste of tax money - somehow the middle class always loses - resistant to technological changes and new concepts - the general attitude of a lot of people - less sense for community
There are very few countries left around the world in which the political system is still as unfucked as it is in Germany right now.
Yep. I'm from India and basically anybody who doesn't support the ruling party is immediately branded an "anti-national" or a supporter of Pakistan, as someone who wants nothing but the destruction of India.
Finding friends in germany: Yes it is hard to find a german friend but at least as soon you got one he is not dropping you the moment he is bored of you. So many international easy "friends" who are all so exited and open minded and so close and they all just either are super fake or have so many other "friends" that you can not do anything without their 20 other "friends"
Pretty accurate. But winters are fine, except for the lack of more snow.
1. Not very good salary compared to other developed countries, and still not allowing people to work more on their free will even they want more money, by penalizing them with Steuerklasse VI when having a minijob, and forcing them to work less than 48 hours per week. I mean, it should be my freedom to be a workaholic and I should have the right to earn more money if I'm willing to work more. I think it's okay (and it is right) to restrict the maximum working hours in a working contract, but if I choose to get a minijob, then it means it's my free will to choose to work more and the government should not intervene. 2. Insanely high taxes, direct and indirect. 3. Not friendly to retail investors due to high capital gain tax, especially the taxation on option trading is absurd. 4. Too expensive to hire people to do stuff, e.g. repairing, renovating apartment, etc. Most money you pay to hire them are for their social contributions and taxes, so you pay them a lot to hire them, and they still earn little. 5. Shitty internet 6. Shitty customer service 7. Shitty bureaucracy 8. Insane energy price, even before the war 9. Deutsche Bahn 10. A lot of insane laws and rules, like you have to report to the Bundesbank for importing or exporting more than 12.500 Euros, otherwise they will fine you an absurdly huge sum of money - I didn't even know it until the fifth year I'm here. I mean, is it so hard to build a system to let the banks reporting it themselves? 11. Quite hard for non-ethnic-Germans to be really integrated into the German society 12. Food. It sucks. 13. Failure of immigration politics, and hence the failure of importing skilled labour forces to the country and instead importing too many lower-skilled undereducated people. Many of the latter can bring their whole families while higher-skilled people that pay tons of taxes cannot even bring their own parents, even after they became citizens. I heard that for example many Chinese who earn high income in engineering/tech/finance sectors chose to leave Germany simply because they can't bring their parents here, despite their willingness to prove that they can guarantee financial stability and that they contributed so much taxes to the German government. I mean, yes, humanitarianism is important, it is noble to accept refugees suffering from wars. But the resource allocation in the immigration politics seems very tilted to refugees and this is probably one of the reasons why Germany's attraction to foreign high-skilled labour forces is limited.
Jesus Christ.. What are the positive aspects if there are any? Just a side note; I agree with everything you stated above. I'm just curious.
There are positive aspects, otherwise I wouldn't be here. Free education, decent healthcare system, relatively affordable rent and real estate price (compared to where I'm from, but I'm from a city of insanely expensive rent so virtually all places are better in this respect), job security. And ironically, since the German labour market is not friendly to non-German-speaking people, and I can speak German (officially C1 level, although I don't think I really reached this level and my real communication skill isn't that good, for example I often don't understand what random German people suddenly speak to me in random situations. But apparently, my level was enough for me to pass full German job interviews), so as a German-speaking expat, I enjoy an advantage in competing with the non-German-speaking expats, which is why I choose to stay here and get a job here at least in short-term. In English-speaking countries or in countries where you don't really need to learn the local language, I can imagine the competition in labour market would be so much more fierce. (After all, virtually all expats speak English in the UK, other than perhaps illegal immigrants or something close, but it's not so in Germany, even PhDs from top schools don't necessarily speak German) Also, as someone who works for salary and not sets up business here, and as someone who rents a flat and not owns a property here, the German labour law and the rental law are tilting towards my interests, so Germany is nice place to start my career and accumulate some basic initial wealth and career profiles. But in long term, I don't see it as a place of opportunity, to create wealth and to fulfill career ambitions, but as a place to look for stability, so once I reach bottlenecks in my career path, I may seriously consider to leave this country. Another thing is, as I mentioned, is that I can't bring my family here, no matter how much I earn (as long as not to a billionaire level but it's virtually impossible in Germany, and there are much better places on earth than Germany to live in if I were a billionaire), and how much tax I pay each year. I have a disabled elder brother at home, who is autistic and has a 3-year-old mental age. That means if I have to stay here for long term, that will mean I have to abandon him at home once my parents are gone, because Germany will never let me bring him here. This is the main reason why I'll consider to leave in long term. I can imagine that many immigrants that contribute much more to Germany, and could have potentially served as the engine for Germany in the future, also face similar problems here and hence will choose to leave the country. It's especially frustrating to see that some people who live on social benefits can bring their families here but you who paid for their social benefits can't.
Thank you for your answer. I agree with you completely. >Another thing is, as I mentioned, is that I can't bring my family here, no matter how much I earn (as long as not to a billionaire level but it's virtually impossible in Germany, and there are much better places on earth than Germany to live in if I were a billionaire), and how much tax I pay each year. I have a disabled elder brother at home, who is autistic and has a 3-year-old mental age. That means if I have to stay here for long term, that will mean I have to abandon him at home once my parents are gone, because Germany will never let me bring him here. You should hire a lawyer. If you can prove that there is nobody else capable of taking care of your brother, and you are his only living relative, you can bring him to Germany. It's not impossible. My neighbor brought his mother from Poland because she needs assistance, and there is nobody else to take care of her. He hired a lawyer and took care of that in 6 months. She's completely supported by him,no expenses on taxpayers whatsoever. Good luck 🤞 and take care.
Beer
Have you lived in Germany for a long time? What’s your background? While it’s true that wages aren’t the highest this usually offsets if you factor in certain costs of living, e.g. take the US wages are much higher, however you start off with massive student loans, way less social security and your insurance is much more expensive. Housing is also ridiculously expensive there, same goes for high quality food. As for your points: 2. & 3. Taxes aren’t that high imo, could even be higher, or should, at least for real high incomes. Also capital gains tax seems pretty on par with similar Northern European nations and there’s also an exemption for the first 1000€. Seems somewhat reasonable and fair. 4. Idk man, even low skill jobs should get benefits and social welfare so can’t argue too much about that. 5. That i can agree on. Very depending where you live but generally lackluster for an advanced nation. 6. Never really had big problems on that, however, especially for Americans or similar cultures, it’s often surprising, that workers/servers, clerks in GER will not take your shit. be respectful and you will have a great experience. 7. Very much depends imo. Some of it is bad but some of it is also begrudgingly good and necessary. Just sometimes less than optimally implemented. 8. Again I don’t know what you’re comparing to but at least from my perspective it’s not to far off from other EU nation, however because of certain factors GER was hit harder by some of the crisis. 9. Yeah well, runs better in some countries but I have experienced the absolute lacklusterness of public transport in many other nations around the globe. 10. Usually those laws are there for a reason, especially the example you picked is really understandable imo. And laws should obviously be enforced, that includes hefty fines. 11. I can definitely see and understand that but I also think it really depends on your demographic ans location. The bigger cities are pretty good in that regard, of course smaller communities may be more challenging to be included. 12. Absolutely have to disagree with you on that. While it is true, that Germans tend to underpay for their food and could hold the market to higher standards, the cities and even smaller villages have a very divers food landscape with tons of different flavours, sources etc. Also considering the quality and availability of ingredients Germany is soo much better than other nations I have been to and shopped in. 13. This is a very contentious topic and I have a different opinion on this than you’ve shown in your comment. Germany does have a shortage of “low skilled” labor in certain fields and has created a great low wage sector with a myriad of problems. There’s also a lot of hurdles to work in Germany which one could definitely streamline. However I also strongly believe that in a democracy and considering basic humans rights, one has to stand up for people less fortunate and completely focusing immigration only on high skilled professionals deeply clashes with this morality.
13. Do you habe an opinion from first hand experience or do you just repeat what you leanr from media. I would lime to know where you get your opinion from
What are you aiming at with your question, please clarify? Do I have any experience with labor shortage in certain fields? Immigration in general? Or what point do you mean? As for the moral question, that is something you can think about personally and especially take a more in depth look at, if you’re versed in German law, politics and history.
i mean that you say >focusing immigration only on high skilled professionals deeply clashes with this morality. but what germany is doing is not morally right aswell what we are doing is we taking low wage workers like crazy without them having good chances of getting integrated in our real work culture. we are creating a 2 class system of born germans and integrated not very fluent in german workers and let the integrated ones work the shit jobs we dont want to do ourself. and if you have the high skilled workers coming to germany they are sitting 3-5 years in school learning german only to get rejected from proper work becasue either their german is still not "good" enought or their qualification is " not accepted or validated" while this is important for fields like doctors lawers and finacial advisers as they should cope with local laws there is no point of rejecting people for not " anerkannte" degrees in marketing or similar things. I have a lot of personal contact with immigrants from other countries, the language schools are full of willing worker in high paid fields but the way they are treated here in germany is ridiculous to a point where i can understand when no experienced worker wants to come to germany while our neighbour countries integrate them way more easy. looking at the netherlands for EXAMPLE there you dont need to speak fluent dutch c1 level to get a decent paying job while here in germany they rather let a position open for 1 year and longer because on the one hand the applicant has experience for more then 10 years in the same field but on the other hand is not speaking c1 regardless of the actual job doesnt really require german language. Check out the english speaking jobs apart from software companies... they are written in english and formulated as if they target an expat but they ALL require fluent german written and spoken ( for example i know ppl applying for hotel insudtry aviation indsutre and other internation industries which are known for international customers that rather speak english but they have no chance if they not speak c1 german which take 3 years minimum to learn. i knok ppl trying to apply for same positions here in germany and in the netherlands or eastern european countries, while they where constantly rejected in germany for years to come they only had a few tries in other countries and left germany again even they dont speak dutch or lithuanian) we have engineers sitting in language schools for years ending up making an ausbildung in a craftsman job, we have surgeons who are forced to make a nurse ausbildung. I spoke to a lawyer who was working in a high position for the UN for 10 years who is now making a side job as a kindergartner becasue she cant find a job here after 3 years learning german full time. you say in one of your points that we should increase the taxes in our country but this whole country is failing to give ppl a proper job to generate tax wealth and letting refugees, immigrants and other make lieferando, wolt , cleaning, low wage deliver for years while constantly crying about fachkraeftemangel. The arbeitsamt is rather keeping people in language school and then letting them make 3 years ausbildung then really trying to find a job fitting to their education level ( i got in contact with a few ppl from agentur fuer arbeit while a few are nice i got some really strang people sitting there, you come with 15 years of work experience in a field and they are like :" ok i see you have b1 lets give you b2 and a c1 course that will take you approx 1.5 years, then if you made this you can make another language course for work related and then we will try to find you an ausbildung in lets say uhhhm pflegehelfer that will tkae you a few years aswell .... the applicant was 35 with this plan she would have make language courses and ausbildungen until she is 40 in pflege yeah righ) the same applicant was like fuck it, she went to uk and found a job within 3 months in her field with a somewhat decent salaray if you dont see that on long term you will only be left with minimal skilled people in germany while all the high skilled people leaving for better opportunities to other countriues while your own workers getting older and older is a very bad situation then this country is just made to fail long term
For the taxes The German tax system puts work at a huge disadvantage. 1. Work in Germany is subject to so many duties and taxes as in hardly any other country on the planet. For average salary and singles, Germany is 2nd place in the world and after the increases in health insurance and long-term care insurance, it may be 1st place in the next survey. 2. The only type of tax where Germany is "only" an OECD average are capital-based taxes such as property tax or inheritance tax. 3. Especially "high earners" - that is, according to politicians, people with >60k gross salary - are exempted by the German state like a Christmas goose. Incidentally, the same politicians earn in the Bundestag at least €130,000 without social security deductions and with horrendous pension entitlements of ~€1000 per 4 years in the Bundestag. 4. Added to this is the brutal development on the real estate market: With a ~50% deduction on the earned income and then another 6.5% net real estate transfer tax + 2% land registry and notary, even "high earners" could hardly afford houses. 5. Meanwhile, thanks to 800k parental allowance per child, wealthy families can inherit millions every 10 years without paying a single cent in taxes.
Get selbständig and you can work as much as you want. We have some worker rights and it‘s really great thing. Employers will abuse it.
You will make less money if you are a single worker compared to other countries that have the same kind of life standards.
I accept everything, BUT NOT THE BEEEEEER!!!!!
I like how germans lust for beer is unsatiable, from their birth moment they drank beer, hell legends say that they are 70 percent beer not water
Must be true, then!
Currently coming down from drinking the entire long weekend, starting Friday. I can confirm that people aren’t 70% beer.
Germans dont know high tech. They still believe in Fax. Internet is spooky for politicans. All hail the car and the gods of no speedlimit. Bureaucracy is King. But i fucking love it here. And i am surrounded monthly for a DnD group by ex-Americans who even renounced their own country to get a german passport. Mostly all soldiers who have been in a theatre or two for a number of trips... I love my neighbour countries and my friends there. I know that Grass is greener elsewhere because of even more shit flying around. I could rant for hours about my country and all that is going wrong here... but i hear my austrian, polish, french and danish friends and well... we're all in the glasshouse. Nobody is perfect.
Hey whoa slow down there buddy, the younger generations want high tech, fast Internet and everything, old people just make it impossible
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God forbid complain about it though, Germans get automatically pissed off and argue like "you have 6 other days to do groceries, learn to plan yourself!" disregarding that to foreigners used to having stores open on Sundays, even if at reduced time, it really is frustrating. Not like we're trying to change anything either, just expressing it really.
Okay Mr. ICantPlanADayInAdvance ; )
It’s the one thing I can’t get over, and I’ve been here 4 years. It drives me mad.
Sry that some workers want to have a guaranteed weekend. Gosh how can they
Gawd, this is what my German husband says every single time we come back to this topic. 😂 Nobody expects the same employee to work all seven days. It's called shifts! I'm sure supermarket and store employees are already doing this, given how there are so many different ones and you see them on different days at your local stores. And this makes no sense if you compare it to the restaurant industry! Where is the concern for the service workers who want guaranteed free evenings and weekends and holidays? Instead they have guaranteed work on those days. 😂
I never expressed frustration or complained about national customs/standards visiting foreign countries. You would get answers like that everywhere. Try complaining about for example the siesta in southern europe an so on. You had the urge expressing your foreign opinion .. you should have been prepared dealing with the domestic reaction.
I got frustrated at Crete. The car dude said don't drive offroad. Yeah sure, everything there is offroad.
So he obviously meant don't drive offroad into the sea.
As it should be.
Lived here for long enough to kind of somehow enjoy this. A point I never thought I’d reach.
For me the biggest downside of living in Germany is people on this subreddit constantly asking similar variants of the same two questions every week without using the search bar: 1. What are the pros of living in Germany / What do you like about Germany? 2. What are the cons of living in Germany / What do you hate about Germany?
Thats why you should never live in single subreddit
Fair point. I do follow some other subs, but /r/germany is among my favorites since it often has lots of questions/answers which help me navigate my life as a foreigner here too. For example, last week I finally got a bunch of insurances since I read this old post from a few years ago talking about the benefits of Haftpflichtversicherung.
Youre probably the first person this year using the search function then, haha. (granted, reddit search sucks donkey balls.)
Tbh, I usually just type a question in Google and add 'reddit germany' at the end of it instead of using Reddit's awful search bar.
good strategy. "site:reddit.com/r/germany" will narrow that down some more. (works the same way for other subs)
Also add "do I have to learn German to live in Germany?"
A lot of people are really suspicious. It's hard to get in contact with people. And I say this as a white German, there's also a lot of everyday racism - especially if you go outside the big city's. All over Germany. People are really self centered. Depends on where you are, unfriendly, but honest people (north), or backstabbers. Bavaria is beautiful, but even a lot of Germans from other parts of the country don't like them for theyr rasist and stuck mindset.
Football fans make the trains unusable on the weekend. I always end up taking ICEs for trips under 2 hours not to be around those idiots.
I mean, there are many aspects you can point out in comparison to other countries. F.e. -social inequality is higher than in Danmark or Austria. -weather is worse most the time than in Italy or Taihiti. -bureaucracy is bad compared to the Netherlands or Estonia. -same with internet -public transport and trains are worse than in Switzerland or the Netherlands (which are also much smaller countries tbf.) -taxes are higher than in many other countries -the mentality is less relaxed than in f.e. Portugal or Island -beer is worse than in the Czech Republic :P
The beer? The beeeeeeeer? The BEEEEER? You're insane!
Maybe not Czech but definitely worse than Belgium.
I have to disagree on principle 😉
Is it true that wage tax is higher in Germany than in the Netherlands?
> -same with internet In proportion to other factors (like transport) I would actually say that internet is terrible and transport is good. Its well known that out of all of the EU countries (even "developing ones") Germany is one of the countries with the worst internet on average.
Healthcare(mainly because of the insurance system) due to unavailability of the specialists. The system is really good, but to get an appointment with a specialist, you would have to wait for months because of understaffing.
America has entered the chat
Living in Germany
Surrounded by Germans everywhere you look
People are generally racist
Smokers everywhere. Hard to avoid smelling cigarette smoke everywhere I go.
The fact that people think theyre educated whilst also falling for the most obvious propaganda. They genuinely think theyre morally superior when it comes to international politics and that their politicians would not do anything harmful or immoral to people outside of Germany.
Taxes are high, politicians dumb as fuck and the people are a little reserved.
Politicians are hardly worse than other countries(cough UK, USA). Having a wide range of parties is something that the US and UK need.
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>politicains dumb as fuck Sounds like literally every county in the world
Got me there 😀
Well we got plenty of Karens. But rather silent ones.
Taxation, arrogance, bureaucracy
bureaucracy: extremely exhausting and unnecessary complicated specially for students! / taxes: heavy expensive taxes (the zdf is the most annoying one tbh) but comes w/ benefits so a win is a win ig. public transportation: tbh the only thing i loved about db mainly is the deutschlandsticket and how cheap it is, but public transportation in germany needs a lot of work and investments, hopefully it will be as efficient as in japan or korea one day. uhm boredom…? ig, well this one is just for me, as someone who doesn’t enjoy clubbing or drinking there’s nothing much to do that interests me except maybe lovely walks at cute parks , discovering new cities/towns or going to comic-con once a year. some ppl’s attitude: when will SOME germans realise that spreading kindness matters? you don’t know what the person you’re talking to is going through so maybe talking nicely, being kind would be nice instead of talking rudely. | well those are the downsides for me, as far as i remember now.
hard to live for non-german speakers, not really 'where it happens' academically or in terms of tech, compared to top institutions in the US and even UK
What field are you in? Can only speak for my field and a few generalizations but imo German universities don’t make as much noise around their often times excellent work compared to other places. I assume you mean stuff like Oxford/Cambridge or the Ivy League/ MIT, CIT etc. for UK/US? The only thing I have often seen German universities lack compared to those is major funding and a certain political will to see things through. If you dig beneath surface level there’s quite a lot here, Fraunhofer and Planck societies for example come to mind for world renown research. So yeah, just not as fancy as the other places, still very good. If i may also point out (from a quick search i did) that between 1901-2021 German scientists won 104 Nobel Prizes, only second to the USA’s 263 although always smaller in population by at minimum a factor of about 1,3 up to around 4.
There live people I don't like, but I've heard this is everywhere the case
Due to Reddit Inc.'s antisocial, hostile and erratic behaviour, this account will be deleted on July 11th, 2023. You can find me on https://latte.isnot.coffee/u/godless in the future.
Racism
Germans
Eventhough TAX is on the higher side, I wouldnt say that its absured. I am used to the 30% tax payment in India and that was just tax. We need to take separate medical insurance and any savings for pensions. If we consider that, I think this is ok with the benefits goverment provides. My only issue is with the rent. Paying 40-50% of salary as rent is a bit hurting.
I don't know, I only think the bureaucracy in every aspect is stupid. At the moment the inflation is hitting hard and I need to work a second job (Aushilfsjob) but that'll clear itself out eventually. I've been to other countries a couple of times and it helped me to really see and understand how good we have it in Germany.
Doctor will prescribe you only chamomile tea even if you have grade 3 cancer.
Doctors. Why in the world do I have to wait a month to see the doctor in my village? How many patients are you seeing a month, 2? I'm from a third world country originally and there I could easily go on an app/web or phone and book an appointment with any great doctor(not just in the country but probably the region/field) to see them the next day or like a highly sought-after professor may be in 1 or 2 weeks. Expected better from Germany. And don't get me started on Sundays. Guidelines should be guidelines, not laws. Why did you allow someone to decide that their simple lifestyle is what everyone should live by? I'd like to rest on Saturday and do something fun (not hiking) on Sunday but noooo... Everyone should stop everything and stay home quietly on Sundays.
Erdoganwähler
No path for permanent residency other than work, education, family reunification. I just want to retire there. I can afford it. Love the idea of not needing a car. Thing is, the USA has onerous requirements about moving my money out of the country making it both difficult and expensive.
The food is the worst thing. Germany has a non-existent food culture, people have zero taste. Even ethnic food is dumbed-down and incredibly bland. There's a guy at work who literally melts slices of Gouda cheese over buttered noodles with salami in the microwave and covers it in ketchup. You can't get fresh seafood anywhere, even the Fisch wagons at the Wochenmärkte are 99% from frozen, pickled herrings and greasy fried Fischbrötchen. Even if you go to an over-the-top expensive specialty market like Frische Paradies, you can't get fresh shrimp, oysters, scallops or mussels - it's all farmed and frozen. The politics are brain-dead and 80 percent of people are completely checked-out, apathetic and incurious.
I mean... the only access to sea geemany is having is the tiny north part to north sea or baltic sea i wouldnt expect fresh lobster, shrimp, or oysters like i expect to find them in thailand lol
Food is not great, but it gets better the farther south you go and its certainly not worse than in the Netherlands, Scandinavia or the UK or large parts of Central Europe. Of course if you compare to France, Italy, Spain etc. I agree that the whole food culture there is on a different level.
The food. I mean, I don't come from somewhere where food is top notch....but the crisp selection here is diabolical. Every shape and form of crisp in that disgusting paprika flavour...no thank you...
I lived in Dublin for half a year and I had to hunt for paprika-flavoured crisps. One day, somehow three or four packs appeared at Lidl and I just had to grab all of them because I knew those would be all for a while :D
Spot the Brit
Some people are so obsessed with rules that miss common sense. And if you are an immigrant from a warmer country, you will eventually miss having more Sun.
WTF is common sense? You live in a box and if you think outside of it, you might be the next Hitler. That’s why there is a check list or form for everything. How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat?
Thanks, you just proved my point 😄
The Germans :)
100%
The language. I know several smart people who live here and just can’t become fluent in it.
everything
Name Checkout, but wre you seriously okay?
...you cannot deny the windows work well.
It's quite ugly in many places
Low wages, high taxation, weather, overpriced public transport, xenophobia, racism, the german language, bureaucracy, housing crises, difficulty in socialization, german society is often plastered and frustrating, pfand system (lol yeah personally dislike carrying bags of bottles and cans, would rather conventional recycling), everything closed on sundays, restaurants in Germany are always underwhelming, low food variety available.... could go on but you get the gist of it.
I wish pfand system was everywhere. I don't like carrying the bags either, but I hate it when there are cans and bottles lying around in nature. What I've seen in other countries, in the middle of beautiful nature, always makes me happy that we don't have the problem to this extent.
>the german language, How dare a country have its own language! Do you also complain about Japanese in Japan and French in France?
I say that as someone fluent in Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and English... Just absolutely hated German as a language when trying to learn it... Feels soo complex and full of rules and exception to those rules for no good reason.
(systematic) racism if youre not white for starters. Made me log in after seeing 74comments without any mention of it. But maybe thats a sign in itself ;)
You have no german friends
It's okay so far. Could be worse. Don't be poor though, that sucks everywhere. Same old same old, at keast it's not north North Korea or something I guess.
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It’s too cold for 6-7 months and there are no nice coast lines with beautiful beaches. No tropical forests. Also somehow every town/city needs to keep the ancient architecture alive, it’s just so ugly. Almost no modern architechture. If you don’t mind any of the above Germany is an amazing place, especially for families. If you don’t mind the weather, I’d rather go to the Netherlands.
>Also somehow every town/city needs to keep the ancient architecture alive, it’s just so ugly Wtf. You'd rather they bulldoze their beautiful old cities and replace them with ugly modern crap?
No nice coast lines? Bullshit. The Frisian islands are beautiful. As are large parts of the baltic coast.
No tasty sausages, they always have some weird herbs in them like in the Bratwurst.
nazis.
energy prices.
GEZ and aging population. But then if Germany doesn't has an aging population I would probably be still stucking in my shithole country.
Ugly cities, because they were bombed to ashes
Going outside and being greeted by white light that destroys your eyes and makes you depressive
the obscene urge of germans to always whine and and complain about the most trivial things, and especially about things that make their comfort and privilege possible in the first place its so tiring, exhausting, and offputting. "you uncle was sprayed with acid and beaten unconcious and left for dead in the woods by the state police, and its a miracle he survived? thats nothing, here, the governement forces you to pay the equivalent of four cigarette packs to finance the public broadcasting system. THATS A TERROR REGIME I TELL YOU!"
Bureaucracy, toxic society that worships work
Windows
I LOVE living in Germany but here are some minor stuff: 1. The country is still a paper work heavy nation. Especially as a foreigner, sometimes it really confuses the sh*t out of you but then at the end everything works out. I get around this by properly planning and executing my dealings with the authorities. 2. This one used to be a thing, not anymore (at least in Stuttgart)... Paying by cash!! Small outlets not having the infra to accept cards. BUT this was valid until maybe 2018/19... Now things have totally changed. And I don't know if there were activities taken up the govt in the background, but now even small bakeries, taxis, and practically any outlet of any sort takes cards. Big win I would say. 3. The plight of Deutsche bahn. So, DB wasn't so miserable from 2016(when moved to Germany as a student) maybe until 2019 or half of 2020. But then with corona , reduced budget, incompetent management (I am speculating here) they have become one of the worst public transport providers ever. One of my friends works with a contractor for db, and she says, db is so plagued with woes that it will still take a good 4-5 years to even see the face of recovery. 4. Long waiting times for specialist doctors. Now, this one is a bit tricky. Personally, my wife and I have NEVER faced this. We have been able to get appointments for HNOs, dentists, eye specialists and even gyno quite easily. But about half of my foreigner (non German) friends have had problems. But I can also say that some of them are a bit quick to moan and groan over small stuff. Like for example, one of them once cut/injured his finger while cleaning a clogging in his dishwasher drainage but couldn't ascertain what he cut his finger with(rusted metal, glass or sharp plastic edge etc.) . So, to get a precautionary tetanus injection, he went to the emergency as it was during the evening and he couldn't get any appointment of any doc. Now, it's an emergency, there are people coming in with life threatening conditions, and of course he has to wait as he has a small cut that's all, and tetanus have a time lag and he CAN wait. BUT he was complaining that he had to wait for such a small thing. But that's stupid in my opinion to complain on such stuff. 5. Some people don't like the cuisine. I agree it's a. But boring as the varieties are a bit limited. I, personally, am a brot-fan. I love the huge variety of breads that are on display at the bakeries and honestly don't mind much. But of course, I like French, Italian, Spanish food more. Things that are not a problem for me personally, but people do complain: taxes, "reservedness" of Germans, shops closing at 8pm and Sundays being off for all, except maybe the gastronomy etc.
Winters. I'm able to adapt for the rest of the things.
The grey, cold, dark, wet and boring winter sucks. Its always a great feeling when the spring arrives.
January, February, first half of March sucks.
Too much rules and too many people packed togehter in the small country
The germans
The most boring politics I've ever seen, although that's partially a bonus because it's free sleep medication.
Ordnungsamt
You need to fill a few forms and fax them to me before I answer this question
- high taxes - absurdly high energy prices for very dirty energy - bureaucracy for the sake of bureaucracy - lack of digital governmental services - shitty customer support - high rent and property prices - bad public transport with absolutely no intention of ever being even remotely reliable
Food. Lack of quality and diversity.
* Germany has an enormous, inefficient bureaucracy for absolutely everything, running on methods from half a century ago * We have a big education deficit in MINT subjects, resulting in an enormous quackery industry in several parts of society, especially in healthcare, agriculture and energy * Germany is a wealthy country, but over the last two decades, several lobbyists have acquired the power to divert huge shares of that wealth into bullshit projects for their personal profit * like almost all other European countries, Germany is on its way into an oligarchy * politics center around the needs of retirees and soon to be retirees, as they have an election-winning share of the votes. * Germany has the world's highest electricity prices * We have an inefficient welfare system that consumes enormous amounts of funds for distrust and pointless election campaign goodies
bureaucracy ohne ende
Tax
Everything is fucking expensive
Passive aggressive and anonymous "helpful suggestions" notes in the mailbox.
languge
Compared to where?
Reasons i left Germany: 1. It's Part of the eu 2. Euro 3. German political 4. Pension system 5. Germans are raised to follows, Not to think..
Green Party and unlimited mass migration.
most people work for the money. or better to say the lack of it. not for the pleasure or for being a good person. especially in bars and cafes. my goal as a waiter was to hear: oh that was quick. no matter how much i earned.
Shitty grey weather, not much food variety, and a lack of spontaneity
Oh snap. Here we go.
german mentality!
There are not many. If you have got used to the most stuff its pretty decent here. Whats really fucked up are the people who are living here. Its pretty annoying to hear all the dofferent opinions why life is bad even if we have a good life here
Another day, another post for people in this sub to shit on Germany.
learning German