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Comment by jotm | Hacker News Reader

This article is bullshit fluff. In Germany, I've witnessed excellent efficiency of course, but most of the workers are dicking around just as much as their counterparts from any other country. They're not machines, after all.

I won't get into details, but here's some first hand observations: the health care is great, the pay is average, the taxes are high, the Internet is average, working hours are average and there is no minimum salary (also there are people who work 9-6 incl. Saturdays, mostly foreigners), people are great, crime is low, language is hard, opportunities through the roof, business is hard (esp. compared to the US and nearby UK), basic living prices are OK, but any "luxuries" are expensive.

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In Germany, I've witnessed excellent efficiency of course,

I live in Germany. Coming from The Netherlands, it surprises me how inefficient Germany often is. A lot of administration is still done on paper. Government organisations barely communicate, e.g. probably half of my non-native co-workers had taxation problems in their first months as a result of that. For every minor thing, you have to fill in a form.

The private sector is not much better. E.g. in NL I could arrange virtually all my banking affairs via internet. Here, except for some internet banks (such as the non-German ING DiBa), you have to go to an office to arrange anything. In NL, most local branches are gone from villages and are slowly retracting from cities as well. Here you have many branches in a small city, with many employees (probably because stuff is all handled on paper) and royal interiors. And then you have to go to the bank every couple of weeks to print your statements using a machine (I am not making this up).

Compared to Northern European countries, there is a huge space for increasing efficiency.

there is no minimum salary

Yes. This is I dislike very much too, it's hard to see people working hard, only earning a few Euros per hour in an extremely rich society. Luckily, Germany may finally see a minimum wage now that the SPD is part of the government again.

> A lot of administration is still done on paper. Government organisations barely communicate, […] For every minor thing, you have to fill in a form.

My impression is that Germany requires a lot of paperwork, but this paperwork is often well guided and backed by organizations that are reasonably big and efficient. So the inefficiencies of living in a "paper bureaucracy" where you have to fill out a form for everything are there, but people barely notice them because the bureaucratic machine is well oiled.

The problem is that if you happen to meet one of the not well oiled parts of the mechanism you will be crushed by the bureaucracy. But this is mostly a foreigners' problem, so it not a very important part of the political agenda.

This is true, I am foreigner and I still find it fairly straight forward to work with bureaucracy here.

    *there is no minimum salary*
    
    Yes. This is I dislike very much too, it's hard to see
    people working hard, only earning a few Euros per hour
    in an extremely rich society.

This is changing January 1st, 2015, at least for some.

    Luckily, Germany may finally see a minimum wage now that 
    the SPD is part of the government again.

Let's not forget who brought the Agenda 2010 on its way, including the Hartz reformations.

Oh, where do you live? You go to bank to print statement - seriously? I live in Berlin, and I never go to bank for anything banking - the popular Sparkasse netbanking works in all cases - online purchasing, rent payments, making transfers, printing statement(like you mentioned) etc.

And I do so many things on internet - getting internet connection, subscribing to electricity providers etc, and direct debit or online banking works here as well.

I have lived in Netherlands too, and I think NL is more efficient and has automated lot of things though.

If I don't print my bank statements for a while, the bank will print them for me and send them by mail (charging me for it, too). Apparently there is a legal requirement for them to do so, probably insurance-related (you must be able to note any unkosher activities within a certain time), so I'm surprised that it's different in Berlin. Could my bank be bs'ing me? Nahh... they're a bank... they wouldn't lie...

I don't know about legal requirement, but in my case - there is option to receive e-statement in netbanking. I have activated it and I get e-statement every month which I can view after logging in. They don't charge anything for this service.

Their love for paper is really annoying, but so far, I've had all the online banking features that you'd find in the US or UK, including e-Statements. Having to schedule an appointment the first time was a bit inconvenient. But Paypal, for example, verified my account using only SCHUFA, and you can sign/confirm stuff online, as well.

What does virtually all banking stuff include? I don't think there are any banks not offering online banking remaining.

I said arranging stuff. I would be surprised if there is any public/general bank in Western Europe without online banking. I mean things like: changing account limits, requesting a credit card, changing the phone number associated with an account, opening an extra savings account.

That is why I asked, it was not clear to me what you meant. Now I can add a second data point, I can do all these things online.

I've had similar experiences, but I think it's more that Germany is inefficient only in comparison to the (I suspect) very few countries that do some of these things as efficiently as Holland.

We will have a minimum wage of 8,50 € from next year on.

That's great, also, Euro 8.50 is very comparable to other Western European countries that have a minimum wage (e.g. NL is 8.63 p/h with a 40 hour work week or 9.85 with a 36 hour work week).

I heard about that - has the law been passed, is it official?

Passed in August.

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