“Consternated” and “stunned”
Business complains about broken relationship with Chancellor Scholz
April 4, 2024, 6:42 p.m
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Germany is in a recession, say the economics and finance ministries and the figures. According to business associations, only Chancellor Scholz is downplaying the situation. He doesn’t take the concerns seriously. A meeting at the beginning of March is supposed to patch up the cracks, but it does the opposite.
According to information from the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” (SZ), the rift between Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the leading German business associations goes much deeper than previously assumed. According to the report, the impression has been prevailing in many company and association headquarters for months that Scholz is underestimating the Federal Republic’s economic problems as well as the country’s decline in important international location rankings. Industry President Siegfried Russwurm complained in the SZ on Wednesday that the economy’s concerns were often dismissed by Scholz.
In fact, both Economics Minister Robert Habeck and Finance Minister Christian Lindner have described the low growth in this country as “dramatically bad”, even “embarrassing” and have announced countermeasures. The Chancellor, on the other hand, still gives the impression today that there is no fundamental problem. Complaining is more in the nature of business associations, Scholz said several times, saying that he knew from his time as mayor of Hamburg that “complaints are the merchant’s song.”
He repeated this sentence at the beginning of March at the traditional meeting with representatives of the leading German business associations on the sidelines of the Munich craft fair – to the displeasure of the association heads present. They had already reported to him in a letter at the end of January about their “great concern” about “the political, social and economic development” in Germany and sent him a list of ten points that they would like to discuss at the planned meeting in March. This included, among other things, competitive electricity prices, reducing bureaucracy, faster approval procedures, combating the shortage of skilled workers and tax reform.
Chancellor spokeswoman reassured
If you believe deputy government spokeswoman Christiane Hoffmann, then exactly this conversation took place with the heads of the BDI, Association of Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK), Employers’ Association (BDA) and Crafts Association (ZDH) in Munich. The Chancellor not only takes the concerns of the economy very seriously, Hoffmann said on Wednesday. Rather, at the meeting on the sidelines of the craft fair, he “exchanged in detail” with the presidents of the associations about their letter and the suggestions it contained. “That was the topic at the Munich top-level discussion in March,” said Hoffmann.
According to the SZ research, that was obviously not the case; at one point there was even talk of “complete nonsense”. Rather, the Chancellor is said to have not addressed any of the ten points during the interview, but instead praised his government for its supposed successes in reforming the administration.
The discrepancy between what the business representatives had hoped for and what Scholz was talking about was so great that the association heads left the meeting “dismayed” and “stunned,” according to the SZ. The word “pissed off” was also mentioned. Apparently not much has changed since then, as a written response from the Chancellery to the associations’ letter was still pending on Thursday.