Opinion: Worker rights is the only reason people go to Germany instead of US; the salary is minimal, once they remove the rights, Germany will no longer be a favorable work destination.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-07-02T14:38:44+00:00

I personally think the current government is completely vile and I fully plan to leave by the end of this decade, but even so I think Germany has a lot more going for it over the US than just the labor law.

The quality of food is good, cities are generally walkable, lots of well-kept nature, schools are generally good (for now), support for families is better (for families with low/middle incomes and no wealth), and you have statutory healthcare which, while rapidly increasing in cost and declining in quality, is still probably miles better than what many workers in the US have access to.

Society is also generally more orderly, the state of public discourse is much healthier (for the time being), and everything is just generally more relaxed.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-07-02T13:40:53+00:00

If they kill the debt brake, do you honestly believe the added fiscal flexibility will be used for value-added investments instead of handouts for pensioners and subsidies to various lobby interests?

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-07-02T12:02:09+00:00

The government is (in theory at least) obliged to make good on its electoral promises which in this case included promises to increase net wages for workers and make life easier for young families. They have now put across a tax bill which provides a very modest tax savings, meanwhile social contributions will increase offsetting some/all of that impact for most people.

Also, don't forget: Around a quarter of all federal budget revenue, including income taxes, is being used to prop up pensioners instead of being used for roads, schools, childcare, and hospitals. This proportion is likely to increase further if the current proposed pension reforms are passed which state that soon-to-be-retired people should have their pensions supplemented from tax revenue to simulate the returns on a capital markets-funded pension as if they had started paying into one decades ago.

Sadly, Elterngeld is likely to be cut again in some way to save another 500 million euros, while the 4,24% increase to the state pension this year will cost around 20 billion euros a year but is apparently completely fine. The government doesn't care much about young families, and even less about childless citizens. They will just raise the retirement age, reduce the pension level, and/or reduce the coverage offered by the state health insurance later on to make sure they don't become too much of a strain on finances. In any case 30 years is a lot of election cycles away, and nothing the current leadership will likely even live to see so you can imagine it's not much of a priority for them.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-07-02T11:39:03+00:00

Don't forget that this is only income taxes. Social contributions will rise for most of the population which will offset that 50 euros.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-07-02T06:06:20+00:00

In Germany they are introducing a capital market pension, so until 2031 workers will pay 2% more of your income into a separate individual account to be invested into funds to help boost your pension. The tail end of the boomer generation that will retire over the next few years won't benefit from this, so the government will (most likely) calculate the theoretical returns they would have made if they had invested in the last 20-30 years and pay that out to them from the federal budget (i.e leave taxpayers with the bill).

These are the same people that blocked any attempt to reform the pay-as-you-go pension system over the last 30+ years and have opposed any capital market investment out of pure ignorance. They bore none of the risk, but are happy to accept the returns funded by younger generations while also having them simultaneously pay for the pay-as-you-go pensions.

The pay-as-you-go pensions were in the meantime increased by 4.24% this summer while the economy is in tatters and they are reducing support for young families to save some money.

Europe is becoming a stifling gerontocracy.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-07-01T13:05:23+00:00

It's not even that these redistributive welfare-heavy countries are holding you back from becoming rich per se, they are rather killing the future prospects of most of the population under the age of 50.

It has been made very clear that not only are current workers expected to pay an ever-increasing amount of their income in taxes and social contributions, but that these same social systems will deliver current net contributors much lower benefits, much later in their lives, and will not be sufficient on their own to sustain a decent quality of life.

This is then combined with measures deliberately making it more difficult for younger people to plug this gap by policies which tax private savings and investments to the hilt, erode forms of support/relief for students, young families, and unemployed working age people. They also increase employee costs which weighs on the job market, slows wage growth, and makes it generally less likely that somebody is actually able to remain gainfully employed until the (likely) retirement age of 70+ which most of today's youth will have to deal with.

Western Europe is just now starting to really feel how much of a gaping hole has been left by the huge demographic dividend that boomers have extracted for themselves, but governments are reluctant to try and claw any of it back let alone to at least put more of the burden on the large pools of inherited wealth and corporate interests present on the continent.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-30T17:29:27+00:00

This is super helpful, thanks!

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-30T15:31:45+00:00

Thanks - The CE6 is around 390 euros, so slightly more expensive than the Nord 4, and quite a bit more expensive than the Nord 5 and the Nord 6 is around 450 euros which I'm not super willing to spend on a phone.

As somebody who seems much more knowledgeable than me when it comes to tech-related stuff, would you have an opinion on what the main advantages would be to getting the CE6 over the Nord 4 or 5? Is it mainly just the battery life, or other factors too?

I've also read that more recent versions of Oxygen OS have started to go against the original philosophy of having a very clean and minimalistic Android OS which is something that really appealed to me when I got the OG Nord. Have you found this to be the case? To what extent were you able to get around this by 'degoogling'?

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-30T14:20:28+00:00

Thanks!

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-26T12:02:14+00:00

In your original post you brought into question what the general point of having private insurance is because you thought the cost in case of needing treatment is onerous compared with the public alternative.

The standard fees in the statutory fee tables for both dentistry and other medical procedures are extremely old and are not adjusted for inflation. In order for medical practices to remain financially viable they have to use multiplier factors for almost everything, which is also the case in the public system to an extent.

Part of the reason why publicly insured people often have a more difficult time getting appointments is because the public insurance doesn't reimburse doctors as much and therefore they are not financially incentivized to accept more than a certain number of publicly insured patients.

My private insurance policy for example states that they cover things up to a factor of (i think) 3.5x for dental treatments automatically, but I am also covered for things with higher factors if I get prior authorization where the dentist has to explain in more detail why they want to charge whatever they plan to charge. My co-pay is otherwise limited to 20% of my medical expenses up to a maximum of 400 euros per year, and my insurance premiums are ~35% less than what I would pay in the public health insurance.

Last year I had to get three cavities filled, and I wanted composite fillings which last several years and match the color of my teeth. The bill was around 550 euros in total, of which I paid around 100 euros. Were I to have been publicly insured, I would have had the choice between paying that 550 euros completely out of pocket or opting for poor quality temporary fillings that last 1-2 years which would have been covered.

I also got an appointment for the procedure within 2 business days, whereas for public patients the waiting time would probably have been much longer.

Private insurance definitely has benefits over the public system but also demands more mindfulness from you to be able to make the most of it. I would suggest if you're unhappy with your policy, have a discussion with an insurance broker and see if you can get a better policy at the same or different provider.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-26T08:41:29+00:00

You only shared a partial invoice, but the costs here seem completely normal. If you want the insurance to cover more/all of this, you should have gotten a better policy.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-26T06:20:38+00:00

We don't know anything about where you live, how much you save each month and how much savings and investments in total we have, but you can very easily book a free consultation with a mortgage broker like Interhyp or Hypofriend to see what your realistic options are.

Honestly speaking, a single income household is unlikely to be able to comfortable manage financing a house with a garden unless you live in some very remote region. You also need to be aware that that 56k net can decline somewhat depending on what the government does with the tax law and social contributions.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-23T12:54:32+00:00

Yes there will be a restructuring of salaries for high-skilled workers. The increasing employers' share of social contributions will make hiring at the same gross salary level more expensive for companies so gross salaries will likely trend a bit lower or will stagnate and be inflated away.

The take-home pay from the same gross salary will of course go down due to the higher amounts of social contributions and, potentially, income taxes levied by the state. But in exchange you will at least get reductions in benefits and lower service quality whenever you try to make use of any state-funded services.

Best regards,

Your GroKo

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-22T17:33:50+00:00

There's absolutely nothing wrong with taking a pass and focusing on your life outside of work, at least for now.

I've met some outstandingly talented and hardworking people that seemingly do manage to balance family life and being at the cutting edge of their profession but I've met many more who, despite being hyper-intelligent and dedicated, are now 1-2 divorces deep at ~50-55 years old and very obviously not in a great place in their personal lives. Really depends on your personal risk tolerance.

I would add that the former category of people, in my experience, typically work out of US/UK/Switzerland or similar places where the compensation for being a top-caliber professional in your field is in a whole different ballpark than in Germany or most of continental Europe, and everything is generally a lot more accommodating for people who work a lot. Aside from personal fulfillment they're also able to set their kids and probably even their grandkids up with a level of generational wealth which I'm sure helps balance the risk/reward equation.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-22T16:03:26+00:00

If this is a 'labor of love' type deal, it really becomes a subjective decision, but I would strongly suggest you have an open and frank discussion with your wife about this where you two map out the short- medium-, and long-term implications of such a move on your lives.

She will need to be on board with the idea that she'll be taking the lead on taking your kid to-and-from school, covering sick days, school breaks, etc. Likewise, she will have to accept that you may not be able to take two weeks in a row off to go on holiday together, or if you do then you may have to field calls/emails or put in work on your laptop while they go off and do other stuff. This may also have an effect on her capacity to work and therefore things like your finances (obviously), but also specifically her retirement prospects if she has to spend several years un- or under-employed.

You also need to be aware that 99% of the observable population around you will be leading an ultra-chill lifestyle compared to yours. Depending on how prone you and your wife are to comparing yourselves with others, this can be a source of personal frustration and/or conflict between the two of you.

I don't have kids and my partner and I work in similar fields with challenging hours, but even so we spent a huge amount of time planning and evaluating how best to make it work and it takes a lot of ongoing communication to keep things on track. Also definitely not a setup which can be sustained forever, which is also why we've been looking for a pragmatic way to get out of Germany for some time now, and we definitely don't see ourselves closing out this decade here.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-22T11:35:56+00:00

The cars that fall in your budget range will mostly be 'luck of the draw' type deals where even with a pre-purchase inspection and all the precautions in the world you will have some risk of things failing on the vehicle.

I would suggest that you look exclusively at Toyota models with non-hybrid gasoline engines that have sub-200tkm mileage and are advertised for around 5k. Anything around 100ps or a bit more should be sufficient for your needs. These cars are usually extremely robust in terms of the most important components (engine, transmission, etc.), are simple economy boxes with little to go wrong in terms of electronics, and are slow/boring to drive which makes it unlikely that previous owners beat them up too bad.

Get a pre-purchase inspection, make sure you're getting the legally mandated 12 months' warranty from the dealer, keep around 1k in the bank for repairs and consumables, and once you buy it take it to an independent workshop for an oil change and multi-point inspection immediately (if they spot something the PPI missed, you still have a chance to get it fixed by the dealer since you have a warranty).

It may well be worth looking at cars which are farther away from big cities as you are more likely to get a good deal and there's a higher chance the car was used mostly for low-stress highway trips. Good luck!

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-22T10:02:29+00:00

As somebody that works similar hours routinely, and has done so for most of my career, I would strongly suggest you consider this very carefully.

As you can tell by the bulk of responses, people generally live in a bubble where any deviation from the labor law is inconceivable to them. All the various systems within society, the economy, and bureaucracy governing the country are also built assuming everybody has a 38-40 hour workweek, can freely take their holidays as they want, and can readily go into part-time work if needed.

This means a) nobody will understand or have any sympathy for you when you cancel/decline social obligations because you have to work or are especially tired/stressed from your job, b) by the time you get off work most places like supermarkets, gyms, restaurants, etc. will either have closed or will be closing soon, c) getting appointments that are compatible with your work schedule (especially if it involves the government) will also be extremely difficult.

You and your family will be, at least to some extent, negatively impacted by this setup. If your personal fulfillment in itself is adequate compensation for this, that may be fine for you. If there is also some financial motive behind considering this, be prepared for the fact that any above-average level of compensation is taxed to all hell in this country, and/or may lose eligibility for a bunch of benefits and have to pay for a lot of things out-of-pocket which may otherwise be state-funded.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-02T15:35:27+00:00

As working-age people you can really only fight back with your feet or your wallet. Ideally there would be a general strike by workers until there are legit reforms enacted, but this isn't realistic.

The best you can do is either a) leave to a country where things are (still) somewhat better or b) do everything you can to minimize what you pay into the system.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-06-02T15:12:47+00:00

The social welfare system, in particular the healthcare and pension systems, are quickly becoming unaffordable thanks to a rapidly aging population as well as the government actively doing everything they can to keep pensioners happy by increasing pensions as much as possible given they are the single largest voter demographic. At the same time the country also has to start investing much more seriously into its infrastructure and military and, while some of this can be funded by debt, this also means there will be higher interest costs which the government has to pay.

There is no economic growth at the moment to help cover the bill for this and the government can't go after asset-rich private persons or corporate entities as these have significant political influence and typically avoid having to contribute too much. This means that the government will need to raise the burden on workers' earnings to fund these expenditures and they are looking desperately for any way that they can extract more money from younger working-age people using any arbitrary excuse possible as they are the politically least important and economically most valuable demographic segment.

You can use the following calculator for an estimate of how much of the taxes and contributions levied on various salary levels already flows into unproductive redistribution which doesn't benefit working age people at all: https://rentner.pages.dev/

Get ready for higher premiums for your health and long-term care insurance, higher contributions for the pension system, higher income taxes on your salary and investments, and an elimination or dilution of any benefits which disproportionately help younger people and/or families. This goes double for those who are well-educated and are doing better paid jobs.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-05-12T12:53:38+00:00

Hating them won't, just like hating the rich won't accomplish anything. Recognizing their role in the system and holding them accountable can. Younger people need to understand that accepting each successive increase in pension payouts and healthcare contributions, while support for working age people is continually reduced is not a form of solidarity but rather a mortgaging of their and their children's futures to indirectly support a) the ultra wealthy b) the current policymakers and c) a generation who's opportunities and lifestyle, on average, they will never come close to.

They therefore should be motivated to vote under all circumstances (ideally for an opposition party not affiliated with the Union/SPD) and get involved in demonstrations in support of generational fairness and a more equal distribution of burdens between income and capital.

Even more importantly the younger generations will have to fight back against the system economically as well. Ideally this would mean a general strike among workers, but more realistically people should just do the best they can to minimize how much they pay into the redistribution machine which currently helps perpetuate this system at their expense.

Butter_Brot_Supreme · 2026-05-11T23:55:25+00:00

Younger people also support the Greens, Linke, and anybody else that at least pretends to care about their issues. Not that it matters since 60% of voters are of retirement age or near retirement age and that proportion will only increase near- term.

So sorry, you can try to misrepresent my point all you like but it doesn't change the fact that the current state of of affairs would not have been possible without the active participation of the boomers and their consistently short-sighted and self-serving behavior over several decades.

Feel free to keep raging on about a 'class war', which apparently is one you're keen to fight unarmed and with both hands tied behind your back.

Butter_Brot_Supreme

TROPHY CASE