How do you say “dead woman walking” in German? Today, the answer to that question is “Angela Merkel” after the German leader announced that she would be seeking neither re-election as chancellor in 2021, nor re-election as head of her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party this December.
—Marshall Auerback
In truth it's more serious than this witticism posits, as Merkel, taking the baton from Gerhard Schröder, did some very bad things:
But there’s another side to this story. However highly regarded, Chancellor Merkel has repeatedly led governments, coalition or otherwise, that championed the neoliberal dismantling of the country’s “social market economy,” especially in services. Her government also pushed and prodded the rest of the European Union in a comparable direction.
In Germany specifically, the end result has been the growth of a two-tiered economy, which has heightened economic insecurity, created declining living standards for much of the population, and exacerbated inequality. In other words, too little “social,” too much “market.”
The combined beggar thy neighbor/beggar thy citizenry policies have been a disaster, but they are integral to the neoliberal project.
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