Weak growth, lack of investment, dilapidated infrastructure: the German economy is frustrated – and rightly so. But it is dangerous to worry more about the past than the future.
In this country, it has long been part of talk show or bar-room folklore to badmouth one’s own business location: weak growth, lack of investment, dilapidated infrastructure, rampant bureaucracy, and even the lack of expertise in the federal government are now the boring standard repertoire of complaints for politicians and lobbyists of all kinds. The head of Deutsche Börse AG recently even dared to say that the German economy was “on its way to the Stone Age”. The man runs a DAX-listed company, and one wonders what he was trying to say to the republic with this nonsense.