Naturally enough, following the US model, the really important thing in the (quasi-)presidential debate isn’t what happens during the debate, but the post-debate exploitation of whatever happens then. So no surprise to find that the SPD and the Greens are jumping all over a claim that Angela Merkel, as well as quoting Reagan, was being a little economical with the truth regarding her own past position on childcare and abortion.
The story is thin, but the meat seems to be that Merkel allegedly claimed that as Minister for Women she introduced a right to childcare from the age of three onwards – in fact she abstained when the legislation went through the Bundestag, because the provision was included in the same bill that established a unified law on abortion for united Germany. It’s not much, but you’ve got to try…
(In the light of the post below, isn’t it strange that squeezing completely unconnected provisions into bills is itself a rather Capitol Hill practice?)
As you will probably realise Alex, the child care and other child support issues *are* especially important in the German context, given the very low fertility levels and the prospects of population decline. Only this week the OECD has come out with a new policy paper on low fertility and what to do about it, where they suggest that such policies need to form an integral part of any serious structural reform package.
Also remember that one of the very few things the GDR did really well was organising childcare for working mothers. Childcare is not one of the things the Federal Republic does really well. Indeed it has generally been so bad that one is tempted to suspect social engineering by ‘values conservatives’ eager to keep wimmins in the kitchen where they belong. But that wouldn’t explain the SPD’s poor record at improving the matter. (Unless, perhaps, the trades unions quietly agree, figuring that wimmins in the kitchen means less competition for the menfolk on the shopfloor.)
Poor availability of childcare, and the concomitant limitation on the ability of both parents (or of a single parent — and this will usually mean a single mother) to compete for the few jobs out there, are certainly legitimate grievances of Germans, esp. those in the east. I’m not certain this is a wise stick for the SPD to beat Merkel with, though. It’s just as likely (if not more so) to benefit the Left Party, that symbiosis between the eastern German PDS and Oskar Lafontaine’s ego.
Damn, I could have guessed that anything I posted to AFOE would be used as an excuse for a debate about demographics.
“Damn, I could have guessed that anything….”
🙂 🙂
“I’m not certain this is a wise stick for the SPD to beat Merkel with, though..”
I don’t care who’s using it as a stick to beat whom with, I just think it should be a central issue in the elections and it doesn’t appear to be. Germany continues to doodle away its quite limited time horizon.
Thank you Alex for bringing this to our attention :).
I don’t care who’s using it as a stick to beat whom with, I just think it should be a central issue in the elections and it doesn’t appear to be.
In the long run it is the issue.
Unfortunately the short run is too bad to allow the long run its due consideration.
Plus, you have to get joblessness under control in the short run to induce the necessary optimism.