Comment by tsss

You must be insane to think that investment is happening in Germany. We have negative real economic growth, by far the worst of all EU countries.

Your contractors made so much not because they are from Germany but because they were freelancers. And if they weren't, they probably had less take-home pay after taxes than your father had, despite the company paying 3 times as much. I'm an engineer with 10 years experience and I make 65k _before_ taxes. Barely over 3k net per month. Many others would be happy to even have a job in the current economic climate. And before you Americans come with "muh free health care": I wait 9 months for an appointment and paid almost 10k last year out of pocket for orthopedic work.