Name: 德國商界為何對政治失去信心？| DW 新聞 (Why German business is losing faith in politics | DW News)
Uploaded: 2025-12-03T17:09:09.000Z
Duration: 15 min 6 s

The government has wasted time on top of everything else.

政府除了其他事情之外，還浪費了很多時間。

They are steering in the wrong direction.

Germany doesn't have so much of a demand problem.

德國並不是有那麼大的需求問題。

And now we just need to get our act together and really to do reforms.

現在我們需要振作起來，真正進行改革。

It's not the case that the AFD has a lot to offer.

並不是說 AFD 有很多東西可以提供。

The policies are really completely absurd.

This would lead to a collapse of our economy.

Is Germany squandering its best shot to overcome the structural crisis that's facing its economy?

德國是否正在浪費其最佳機會來克服其經濟面臨的結構性危機？

Well, Clemens Fust is president of the IFO Institute in Germany.

好的，Clemens Fust 是德國 IFO 研究所的所長。

他現在加入我們，提供更多資訊。

Clemens, we wanted to have you on one more time as we close out this year.

Clemens，在今年即將結束之際，我們想再邀請你來聊聊。

If we look at the past three, we've seen two years of recession and expected stagnation this year.

如果我們看看過去三年，有兩年是經濟衰退，今年預期是停滯。

Before we get into the political issues, are we seeing any positive signs in this economy as it's developing right now?

在我們深入探討政治議題之前，這個經濟目前發展的情況，我們有看到任何正面的跡象嗎？

Unfortunately, we are now at the level of GDP we had in 2019.

很可惜，我們現在的 GDP 水準回到了 2019 年。

So that is really overall six years of stagnation.

所以總體來說，這已經是六年的停滯了。

What we see is that private investment, maybe the biggest challenge.

我們看到的是私人投資，這可能是最大的挑戰。

所以我們經歷了「失去的十年」。

The only sector which is expanding is the public sector that increases its employment.

唯一擴張的部門是公共部門，它增加了就業。

Without the public sector expanding, we would have had a much stronger recession.

如果沒有公共部門的擴張，我們將面臨更嚴重的經濟衰退。

The positive sign we see at the moment is that the government will spend a lot more next year, even more.

我們目前看到的正面跡象是，政府明年將投入更多資金，甚至更多。

And that will push the German economy to growth.

But the question is, how sustainable is that?

但問題是，這種成長有多可持續？

Will this just be a short term effect or will this be really a mondorable return to growth rates?

這只會是短期效應，還是會真正回到一個可持續的成長率？

I want to go back to what you just said about public spending and investment.

我想回到你剛才說的關於公共支出和投資的部分。

You recently gave a lecture and introduced a chart comparing these three things.

你最近有場演講，介紹了一張比較這三者的圖表。

Economic output, public spending and private investment.

經濟產出、公共支出和私人投資。

這些都是以2015年為基準的指數。

As you mentioned, we see everything more or less bunched up until about 2018.

就像你提到的，我們看到大約到2018年之前，這三者大致都差不多。

We know generally the German economy ran pretty well until then.

我們知道，在此之前德國經濟總體來說表現相當不錯。

為什麼從那之後一切都分道揚鑣了呢？

To what extent is the rise in public spending a consequence or a cause of the drop in investment, for example?

例如，公共支出的增加在多大程度上是投資下降的結果，或是原因？

It's certainly not a consequence of the foreign investment, but it's probably partly driving it.

這肯定不是外國投資的結果，但它可能部分推動了外國投資。

So what we've seen since 2018 is really difficulties of some key sectors in Germany.

所以我們從 2018 年以來看到的，是德國一些關鍵產業真的遇到了困難。

The automotive sector and increasingly also machinery.

汽車產業，還有越來越多的機械業。

These were sectors that were very successful Both within Germany and internationally.

這些產業在德國國內和國際上都曾經非常成功。

And now they are coming under increasing pressure, partly related to higher domestic costs and partly related to other countries becoming better, more innovative, in particular China.

現在它們面臨越來越大的壓力，部分原因與國內成本上升有關，部分原因與其他國家變得更好、更有創新力有關，特別是中國。

Germany has always had a wobbly energy policy, very special and narrow energy policy, switching off its nuclear plants and so on.

德國一直以來都有個搖搖晃晃的能源政策，非常特別且狹隘，像是關閉核電廠等等。

And then came the shock of Russia's attack on Ukraine and the end of the delivery of gas from Russia to Germany and Europe.

接著俄羅斯攻擊烏克蘭，以及俄羅斯停止供應天然氣給德國和歐洲，這又是一記重擊。

這對德國造成了非常顯著的影響。

15% of value added in manufacturing in Germany is energy intensive.

德國製造業增加值的 15% 是能源密集型的。

So we have automotive parts of the machinery industry and the energy intensive industries.

所以我們有機械產業的汽車零件，以及能源密集型產業。

所以有三個重要的產業陷入危機。

And in the meantime, the public sector has been expanding because the government has increased debt and has just increased spending without regard to the general economic situation going to that point.

同時，公共部門一直在擴張，因為政府增加了債務，並且只是增加了支出，卻不顧整體經濟狀況。

This was supposed to be a period of reforms that could help business conditions, for social spending, for energy prices, for bureaucracy.

這本來應該是個改革時期，有助於改善商業條件、社會支出、能源價格和官僚體系。

Right now the government is bogged down in a debate over pensions.

現在政府卻陷入了關於終身俸的辯論。

It started out with a mix of measures and some were directed towards getting the economy back to growth, like acceleration, accelerated depreciation, generally for investment.

一開始推出了一系列措施，其中有些是為了讓經濟重回成長，像是加速折舊，總體而言是為了投資。

The perspective that the corporate tax will be reduced as from 2028.

企業稅預計將從 2028 年開始降低。

So those were two steps in the right direction.

所以，這是兩個正確方向的步驟。

But apart from that, not much has happened.

And a lot of money has been spent on interest groups like the restaurants that cut in the value added tax for restaurants and questionable ideas like tax breaks for overtime work.

而且很多錢都花在利益團體上，像是餐廳增值稅減免，還有像加班費稅收優惠這種 questionable 的想法。

The problem in Germany is not that we don't enough have enough overtime work.

德國的問題不是我們沒有足夠的加班。

The issue is we have a lot of part time work.

So the government has really lost time to some extent.

所以政府在某種程度上確實浪費了時間。

And now on top of everything else, they are steering in the wrong direction because they are massively increasing pensions and putting a huge burden on future budgets.

而且現在，他們更是把事情搞砸了，因為他們大幅增加終身俸，給未來預算帶來巨大負擔。

A budget that hasn't even digested the increased spending on the military, which is debt finance at the moment, but

一個還沒消化完軍費增加的預算，目前是靠債務融資，

So there really is a big challenge here in this debate about pensions.

所以關於終身俸的辯論，這裡確實面臨一個大挑戰。

I've heard the argument that more generous pension payments also generates economic activity as pensioners spend.

我聽過一種說法，更豐厚的終身俸支付也能透過退休人員的消費來帶動經濟活動。

You could say the same thing maybe about some of these other tax breaks and incentives.

你或許也可以說，這些其他的稅收減免和獎勵措施也是一樣的道理。

Is that not a fair point when you're looking for economic activity right now?

當你現在尋求經濟活動時，這難道不是一個合理的論點嗎？

No, our problem is not a lack of domestic consumption demand.

不，我們的問題不是國內消費需求不足。

So our wages have been rising relatively steadily and incomes of pensioners have been rising quite well.

所以我們的薪資一直相對穩定地上漲，退休人員的收入也漲得不錯。

通貨膨脹率在百分之二到百分之三之間。

So Germany doesn't have so much of a demand problem, it's really a structural problem.

所以德國並不是有那麼大的需求問題，這真的是一個結構性問題。

So we need structural reforms and we need improved incentives to work.

所以我們需要結構性改革，也需要改善工作誘因。

So what we're doing here is reduced incentives to work because taxes will rise as a consequence of these pension dish decisions.

所以我們現在做的，是降低了工作誘因，因為稅收會因為這些終身俸的決定而隨之增加。

To what extent does the situation in Germany mirror that of France?

德國的情況和法國有多大的相似之處？

To some extent, where you also see a debate about social spending and debt spending.

在某種程度上，你們也看到關於社會支出和債務支出的討論。

Let me back up and say that we see from other economists too a similar assessment that the money set aside from the German government should be spent for larger investments that then springboards private spending later.

讓我先退一步說明，我們從其他經濟學家那裡也看到類似的評估，德國政府撥出的資金應該用於更大的投資，進而帶動後續的私人支出。

As an economist looking at this, do you just sort of have to say that's not going to happen for the sake of some sort of political stability?

身為經濟學家來看，你是不是隻能說為了某種政治穩定，這是不可能發生的？

Because these debates are so escalating all the time that it's just sort of outside of your realm in some way?

因為這些爭論一直在升級，所以在某種程度上已經超出你的管轄範圍了嗎？

I mean, so what we see in Germany is that the debt earmarked for investment is at least to a large extent, maybe half not going to investment, so it's used for other things.

我的意思是，所以我們在德國看到的是，用於投資的債務，至少有很大一部分，也許一半，並沒有用於投資，而是用於其他事情。

Does that make sense to maintain political stability?

這樣做有助於維持政治穩定嗎？

it certainly doesn't in the long term because the budget problems get worse.

長期來看絕對不會，因為預算問題會越來越嚴重。

And maybe there, there are lessons to learn from France.

或許在這裡，我們可以從法國身上學到一些教訓。

Now France looks like it's having a completely dysfunctional government because the political parties in the parliament cannot agree apparently on any reform that will reduce the budget deficit, although everybody knows they urgently do need to reduce that deficit.

現在的法國政府看起來完全失能，因為國會裡的政黨似乎無法就任何能減少預算赤字的改革達成共識，儘管大家都知道他們迫切需要削減赤字。

But it's very hard to agree on these things.

Of course, it's always easier to solve distributional conflicts by postponing them to the future, but

當然，透過將分配衝突延後到未來來解決，總是比較容易，但是

所以，把錢押在上面，借來的錢。

And France is now really in a critical situation.

法國現在真的處於一個關鍵時刻。

Interest rates on French debt are rising and Germany is fiscally still in a much better position, but

法國債務的利率正在上升，而德國的財政狀況仍然好得多，但是

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德國商界為何對政治失去信心？| DW 新聞 (Why German business is losing faith in politics | DW News)

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