Germans not so rich

[DodgyAgent]

So for all you UK denigrators wailing about the lack of manufacturing, excess credit and extolling the virtues of the Germans a few of your sacred cows are not so sacred after all.

The Germans are walking tall in the eurozone, but just how rich are they? - Telegraph

In April, an ECB survey caused a furore by suggesting that whereas median net household wealth was just over €50,000 in Germany, in Greece the figure was just over €100,000, in Spain €180,000, and in Cyprus over €260,000. You can imagine how that went down on the Cologne Omnibus.


For a start, Germany may have sold lots of Mercedes and BMWs to Greece and that makes the export figures look good. But the Greeks cannot pay for them. Instead, Germany has "loaned" Greece the money. Yet there isn't a hope in Hades of all this money being paid back.

[doodab]

He who measures his wealth in units of currency will always be poor.

[darmstadt]

One can say anything one wants with selective commenting:

In fact, this evidence is highly mis-leading because all sorts of assets were not included which figure particularly strongly in Germany, notably state and occupational pension wealth.

Yet on GDP per head the UK is just above the eurozone average and only just behind Germany....Now admittedly this picture can be misleading because of the much greater use of credit to support consumption in the UK, and the associated low rates of personal saving.

:-)

[MyUserName]

He who measures his wealth in units of currency will always be poor.

Are you sure? Don't people like Bill Gates use exactly that metric and they do not seem that poor?

[doodab]

Are you sure? Don't people like Bill Gates use exactly that metric and they do not seem that poor?

Bill Gates seems to me to be an excellent example of someone who sees money for what it's actually worth.

[MyUserName]

Bill Gates seems to me to be an excellent example of someone who sees money for what it's actually worth.

So ... are sure that measuring wealth via units of currency means one will always be poor or not?

[alreadypacked]

If they can "Fix" the numbers so the UK is rich, making the Germans poor is np.

[doodab]

So ... are sure that measuring wealth via units of currency means one will always be poor or not?

Do you feel rich?

[MyUserName]

Do you feel rich?

Sometimes ... when he is sleeping.

[DodgyAgent]

One can say anything one wants with selective commenting:





:-)

Like the myopic pro german you are you then leave this bit off

But that does not account for all of it. British workers are relatively well paid, work relatively long hours and, (compared with some countries), at least until recently, are comparatively lightly taxed.