Lingering divide?

Transport and construction minister Peter Ramsauer of the conservative Christian Social Union (CSU) was quoted in the Welt am Sonntag newspaper as saying there should be more investment in infrastructure in the west of the country.

"In the last two decades, we have neglected to invest in roads and rail" in the west, Ramsauer told the newspaper, referring to the reunification of East and West Germany 20 years ago. "Now the time has come to make up for what we have failed to do," he added.

He said there was a "considerable backlog" of important construction projects in western Germany.

Ramsauer said thanks to a 5.5 percent solidarity tax on German taxpayers and hundreds of billions of euros in state funding, roads and other infrastructure in the former East Germany were no longer in disrepair but had instead been transformed into some of the finest in the world. The transport minister added that this progress was sometimes achieved at the cost of infrastructure in western Germany.

Ramsauer’s comments have drawn negative reactions from some other members of the governing coalition, especially as they came amid celebrations to mark the 20th anniversary of the Wall tumbling and national unification.

Cornelia Pieper, deputy chairman of the Free Democrats – junior partners to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative bloc – criticized Ramsauer’s comments as a "tasteless contribution."

She was quoted as telling the Leipziger Volkszeitung newspaper that the minister had made the comments "in complete disregard for reality and has unnecessarily disturbed this day of joy."

‘1.3 trillion euros transferred to former East Germany’

A new study out on Sunday showed that reunited Germany transferred some 1.3 trillion euros ($1.9 trillion) to prop up the former communist east in the years following the Berlin Wall's fall.

The Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH) said the huge sum spent between 1991 and 2005, had largely gone toward social welfare payments for easterners.

IWH President Ulrich Blum said only about 10 percent of the subsidies had gone to measures intended to spur economic growth while about 67 percent went towards social welfare benefits.

"The fact that the transfers increased rather than decreased in the last few years shocked us," Blum told the newspaper.

Another study released this week showed that the eastern German economy has caught up with the west faster than expected.

The private Cologne-based IW institute said that gross domestic product per capita, a key indicator of living standards, has risen in the east from 30 percent of that in the west in 1991 to 70 percent today.

The institute said that by 2020, average GDP per capita in the east could reach 80 percent of that in the west and that the most prosperous eastern states could have overtaken the poorest of their western counterparts.

rb/AFP

Editor: Rick Demarest