Election Time in Germany

[Lilium of the Valley]

Re: Election Time in Germany

Lol bums haha

yup...i would have never thought to see this in the middle of the street, seriously. lmao

[toxicyarnglare]

Re: Election Time in Germany

To be honest that government system sounds pretty nice. In the US the only parties getting representation are Democrat and Republican, with just occasional independents. It's pretty annoying. ._.

[DanieMarie]

Re: Election Time in Germany

I definitely think it has its advantages. I prefer multiparty systems (I grew up in one!) and I think the representational portion is handy. Sometimes having coalitions can be difficult, but it does force parties to work together and make compromises. I think the only problems are that a) there is so much lobbyism going on, which often benefits large corporations and not people and b) a lot of Germans seem to be unaware of what makes the country successful. Merkel and the CDU have nothing to do with this country's economic stability. In fact, a lot of economists (both German and international) believe that conservative, austere CDU/CSU policies are bad for Germany and Europe. I agree (paradox of thrift at work). Even though the country is doing well, there are a lot of cracks (namely wage stagnation that has caused a sizeable chunk of the population to rely on state support and be unable to move forward or contribute to the economy in any significant way) and it could do a whole lot better in the long term with some stimulus instead of austerity. And that rings far more true for other European countries which have been forced into austerity. I'm not saying that stimulus can't come with requirements for financial reform (Greece's public spending was out of control), but the cuts that have been forced on a lot of countries have pushed their economies between a rock and a hard place.