-Caveat Lector- >From http://www.guardian.co.uk/germany/article/0,2763,762136,00.html
Dole queues drive young to suicide bridge Unemployment in the east will dominate German elections John Hooper in Berlin Wednesday July 24, 2002 The Guardian The Göltzschtalbrücke is the world's biggest brick bridge. It stands 250ft high in a deep river valley near the town of Reichenbach in south-eastern Germany. Between the river and a car park from which you can admire this feat of engineering, a banner has been put up in the trees which reads: "Jesus always has time for you." People have been throwing themselves off the Göltzschtalbrücke ever since it was finished in 1851. But, according to Marjon Thümmel, the editor of the Vogtland Anzeiger local paper: "This is the worst year anyone can remember." Six young people have leapt to their deaths from the Göltzschtalbrücke and another nearby railway bridge in the past 12 months. All but one came from the formerly communist east. Three chained themselves together. Just to make sure. Though doubtless influenced by specific psychological factors, the recent surge in suicides at the Göltzschtalbrücke has turned the bridge into a symbol of the hopelessness that today infuses the young of eastern Germany - a hopelessness rooted in the lack of prospects in a region bleeding jobs and population. Unemployment - particularly eastern unemployment - has become the dominant issue in Germany's general election campaign. Its importance was highlighted yesterday when the chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, in effect, launched his drive for re-election with a high-profile meeting with the personnel director of Volkswagon, Peter Hartz, whom he has commisioned to findways to trim the dole queues. Pollsters reckon half the country's floating voters are in the east, where the jobless rate is almost 18%, compared with less than 8% in the west. So eastern voters not only have an overwhelming interest in the unemployment issue, but also a disproportionate ability to influence the outcome of the poll on September 22. Reichenbach encapsulates the profoundly paradoxical situation in which the east finds itself. The decision to convert easterners' savings and earnings at a rate of one ostmark to one deutschmark made them rich overnight, unleashing a consumer and construction boom that was boosted by aid from the west. But the same decision robbed the east's industries of their price edge and, together with hefty wage settlements, made many of its businesses uncompetitive. The town hall is packed with gleaming new furniture and equipment. The square outside is being repaved with public money. The people walking across it are infinitely better dressed than they were before reunification. They own better cars and smarter houses. But their town's ability to fend for itself has been destroyed. Its textile industry, which once provided 4,000 jobs, now offers just 800-1,000. "Overall, more than half the jobs in Vogtland have been lost since reunification," Marjon Thümmel said. In a youth club on the edge of Reichenbach, 16-year-old Björn Schumann sat playing cards with his friends on a rainy afternoon. Through the condensation on the windows, you could just make out a line of communist-era housing blocks, recently painted in pastel shades of lilac, mulberry and primrose. Björn left school this year along with 21 others. Only six have found work. "The rest are out looking for something. Every year it gets worse," he said. Manfred Lenzer, on the other side of the table, had been looking for work for nine months. He had lost count of the number of applications he had sent off - "Twenty? Thirty?" - but still nothing. "The east is dying," he said, angrily flinging his cards on to the table. "Just look at the streets. There aren't any young people. Just old people." Reichenbach has lost a sixth of its population since reunification. "Girls in particular," said Holger Kairies, the social worker in charge at the youth club. "They go to Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg [the prosperous southern states of former West Germany]. And they leave permanently." Sometimes they come back to visit, though. As the card game broke up, two young women burst into the youth club, shaking rain from their hair. "The girls from Munich," said one of the card players. Nadine Christoph, 23, had found herself a job as a hairdresser at the airport. "As a stylist here, I'd get about half what I earn in Munich," she said. Back at the town hall, the mayor, Dieter Kiessling, detailed all that the authorities had done in their unsuccessful efforts to hang on to their young people: the two new sports halls, the £1m spent on doing up another youth club. "It hurts," said Wolfgang Eckstein, the head of the town hall's youth and sports department. "Every time someone says: 'I have to go'." Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A<>E<>R + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Forwarded as information only; no automatic endorsement + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without charge or profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this type of information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + "Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut." --- Ernest Hemingway <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! 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