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The author is a member of the chief board of Bertelsmann Stiftung
Mario Draghi’s latest report on European competitiveness has sounded alarm bells throughout the continent, notably in Germany. The previous European Central Financial institution president tells it as it’s: stagnating productiveness, lagging digital innovation, an ageing inhabitants, a shrinking workforce and the double load of digital and inexperienced transitions put the European mannequin in danger.
Gone are the times when Germans might think about unhealthy financial information from Europe as different folks’s issues. The continent’s as soon as unchallenged industrial chief is in serious trouble — a lot in order that some neighbours now, solely half-jokingly, speak about it as a “failed state” the place the trains don’t run and 10-year-olds can’t learn. Not solely does Germany’s picture overseas want enhancing, the nation additionally must rethink its development mannequin and is finest suggested to take action in co-operation with fellow Europeans. This is the reason the primary and loudest political reactions from German policymakers on Draghi’s magnum opus miss the purpose.
The report affords a compelling case for a coherent industrial coverage. But few in Berlin have engaged with the query of how one can remedy the EU’s weaknesses, notably these of its largest financial system. Fairly than beginning to consider what a brand new financial technique for the nation and the continent would appear to be, most have stayed of their consolation zones: liberal finance minister Christian Lindner or Friedrich Merz, the Christian-Democrat opposition chief, rejected the report as a result of it devotes just a few paragraphs to the elevating of latest EU debt.
Germany’s economy is deeply built-in with the European single market, with greater than half of its exports destined for different EU international locations. The nation’s key sectors — together with vehicles, equipment and chemical substances — depend on the only market’s harmonised laws. The customs union simplifies commerce and the EU’s regulatory energy can be a aggressive benefit. German firms have benefited from the euro’s stability, which permits long-term planning with out the chance of forex fluctuations.
For many years, German prosperity was constructed on export-driven development, with a talented workforce, sturdy innovation system and environment friendly infrastructure underpinning its success as a world chief in manufacturing. In the present day, nevertheless, the reliance on conventional industries leaves Germany susceptible. In different international locations digital innovation drives development, however German firms failed to understand the potential of latest applied sciences, together with EVs, once they nonetheless had a head-start.
The Federation of German Industries (BDI) estimates that Germany wants to take a position €1.4tn by 2030 to strengthen its industrial base and keep aggressive within the international market. The BDI warns that 20 per cent of Germany’s industrial worth creation is in danger — notably in industries akin to automotive, chemical substances and energy-intensive sectors together with coking vegetation and mineral oil processing — until excessive vitality prices, labour shortages, extreme forms and under-investment in crucial infrastructure (notably transport and digital networks) are addressed. Certainly, with out reform and funding, Germany dangers additional deindustrialisation and the decline of the small and medium-sized enterprises that type the spine of its financial system.
It wants main funding in 5G networks, broadband and digital platforms to stay aggressive. The nation additionally falls brief on safety, each when it comes to typical defence spending and the power to fend off hybrid threats. Housing, transport, training and the well being system are equally urgent points that undermine the credibility of mainstream politicians at each the nationwide and regional ranges, taking part in into the fingers of populists.
Many in Germany and different northern European international locations nonetheless assume that an EU industrial technique would quantity to them having to help the remainder of the bloc. However that will get issues the improper method spherical: Europe has the chance to reassert itself within the digital sphere, grasp its inexperienced transition and innovate extra. Checked out in that mild, Germany or the Netherlands, say, would acquire as a lot they offer from a brand new industrial technique.
However this additionally requires each the European Fee and different member states to not deal with industrial coverage as a car for redistribution by stealth. As a substitute they need to be severe about constructing on strengths and enhancing flexibility for the advantage of the continent as an entire. Draghi’s report affords a blueprint — it’s as much as everybody, together with Germany, to grab the chance.
