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This
outpouring of anguish at Germany’s alleged terrible plight
was provoked by Chancellor Schroder’s rescue of Philipp Holzmann,
the nation’s second-largest construction firm. On top of
that, the Chancellor indicated that he was opposed to the proposed
$125 billion hostile takeover of Germany’s Mannesmann AG
by Britain’s Vodafone Airtouch PLC. From the hysterical splutterings
of our reporters and editorial writers you might have thought
Lenin had just seized power in Berlin. Holzmann, a 150-year-old
company that had built opera houses and train stations in the
19th century, had got into trouble with some bad debts and the
creditors were about to pull the plug. The company filed for bankruptcy
and tens of thousands of people were on the verge of being thrown
out of work.
But
the German public did not respond the way the American public
would. It failed to be moved by the tragic plight of the poor,
down-at-the-heel bankers. Instead, it demanded that the venerable
company be saved. "Bank Disgrace!" ran the banner headline
in the mass-circulation newspaper Bild. The paper also
published photos of the 20 bank chiefs who had refused to bail
out Holzmann, as well as their salaries. Bild, incidentally,
is a conservative newspaper. Schroder came up with DM250 million
of government money and persuaded the creditor banks to support
a restructuring program as part of a DM4.3 billion bailout. Schroder
saved Holzmann and for the first time ever he is wildly popular
in Germany. "I wanted to be sure my buddies had something
under the Christmas tree… I came here to get the banks to
be responsible. To be responsible is not to let a company that
I consider salvageable, break up," Schroder explained. Such
talk would be unthinkable in the United States where the highest
moral imperative is the unhindered operation of the free market.
Workers are taught to sacrifice themselves for the sake of "competitiveness."
In American eyes Schroder committed sacrilege. "Throwing
in a generous dollop of taxpayer money to avert a big corporate
collapse and save jobs," explained an incredulous AP reporter,
"the chancellor has turned leftward to make amends with the
many German voters who reject his modernizing course… Schroder
came around to defending Germany’s well-worn, consensus-based
corporate culture." Note the easy identification of "modernizing"
with, in effect, Americanizing. A Reuters story summed up the
issue excellently: "Analysts say German banks, locked in
mounting competition with international banks, can no longer justify
bailing out loss-making companies just for the sake of rescuing
jobs." Of course not. Who cares about jobs? The only thing
that matters is staying competitive and that means continuously
boosting the value of the banks’ shares.
Thanks
to Schroder, the Germans have now made clear they are not about
to adopt the Blairite or American model of capitalism. They have
no intention of allowing their companies to be taken over, stripped
of their assets and their workers fired–all in the name of
cutting costs, improving balance sheets and therefore increasing
shareholder value. The Germans are not about to fall on their
knees before the holy altar of "labor flexibility."
Here in the United States our media–now more and more simply
the spokesmen for the corporations that own them–invariably
applaud the daily corporate mergers and acquisitions. Time and
Warner, Viacom and CBS, now Washington Post and NBC–the
hacks fairly drool as they detail how many billions of dollars
these new conglomerates are now worth. That people are thrown
out of work is of little consequence. That resulting new entities
are scarcely innovative, interesting or productive is of even
less consequence. No, the only thing that matters is shareholder
value. This is what the so-called "modernization" of
the economy means. This is what the moribund, lackluster Germans
seem unable to embrace.
Interestingly
enough, despite predictions of its imminent demise, the German
economy is actually astonishingly robust. A reader of the American
press would be surprised to learn that in 1998, the hidebound,
sclerotic Germans improved their manufacturing productivity by
4.3 percent–the best performance of any OECD country. Americans
workers would be surprised to learn–unpleasantly so unfortunately–just
how much better off their German counterparts are. In 1997 hourly
direct pay for manufacturing workers in the United States was
$14.34 an hour. In Germany it was $20.94 an hour. To be sure,
the Germans have high unemployment. But what is better? To wash
dishes here at $2 an hour? Or to be unemployed in Germany and
to enjoy generous welfare benefits, first-rate health care and
a largely free education system–one that is vastly superior
to anything in the United States? Remember, too, that during the
past decade the Germans have had to bear the staggering costs
of absorbing the former East Germany.
"America
uber alles" was always a nonstarter. Forever basking in the
Cold War victory, Americans fail to see how much has changed in
the last 10 years, as Ambassador Kornblum’s disastrous performance
demonstrates. For all the bluster of the Washington elite, America’s
economic performance is simply too insipid to support an imperial
foreign policy.
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