Yeah.

The thing that really made me aware of this is the fact that the German government still can't figure out how to get the money out of the EU Covid fund. It's billions of euros, sitting there for years, but they agreed to digitize some government offices as a precondition to receiving the money...

and they just. can't. do. it.

So the state says, "We need more people doing X! Pay them more to do X!"

Then those workers earn more, but then they pay more income taxes, get discouraged and cut their hours or quit.

Or the state says, "We need more X being built! Offer more money for X!"

Then those businesses find out that they need to fill out 864 forms, hire a lawyer, a tax accountant, a diversity offer, wait a few months or years for a permit, do an environmental assessment, apply for a subisidy and a government loan with another 107 forms... so they cancel the contract.

We have reached the point where the state throwing money at problems doesn't fix the problems because the state takes the money away again on the other end.

10¢ more, sorry. It's not that dramatic. 😂 But only on their portion of the price, so maybe 1¢ more per package.

Here's a concrete example. This milk costs consumers €1,69/liter, but the producer receives between €0,37 and €0,42.

So, less than a quarter of the consumer price actually goes to the farmer.

https://www.edeka24.de/Berchtesgadener-Land-haltbare-Bergbauern-Milch-3-5-1L.html

Germany is when almost everyone votes against the Greens because they're making us poor and unsafe....

and then the Greens form a government. 😂

We have a big garden behind the house and our relatives and neighbors are farmers.

Dafür gibt es leider auch kein Personal. 🤷‍♀️

Mehr Geld erzeugt nicht automatisch mehr Leistung.

My company keeps asking me to switch to full-time, but it's like

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I just got a paycheck where they deducted 47% of my salary. 😏

Germans not being able to afford decent, regional food hasn't been seen since the war.

I guess we can all subsist off Chinese oatmeal and African vegetables.

This is one major reason why an increasing number of the working population is simply cutting their hours or refusing to work, altogether.

The marginal return on productive labor is declining.

A lot of Germans see their living costs rising and assume that producers must be earning higher real profits, but that is not necessarily what is happening.

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We haven't quite reached "We pretend to work. They pretend to pay us." levels of economic fucked-upness, but we're getting there.

This is, for example, the breakdown in electricity costs. About half goes to the electricity producer. The rest is taxes, government fees and regulation.

Everytime the producers increase efficiency and lower their cost per unit, the government increases their portion. Then the consumer price stays the same or even increases, but the producer's margin shrinks.

It's the same dynamic in farming, manufacturing, engineering, construction, transportation...

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It's mostly government regulation and supply manipulations/boycotts driving up costs, here. Same as in the housing and energy market.

The costs hit the local producers, but not the foreign producers, so the foreign stuff is cheaper.

Germans actually eagerly buy the regional stuff, despite the higher prices, but at some point we start to get sticker-shock and can't afford it, or can't afford as much of it.

Pro-tip:

No cheaper fertilizer than raw sewage.

You heard it here first, buddy. 😎

😂