“Hart but fair”: Do German officials really live longer?

Well. The German officials. What are we doing now? An hour later, this question was still not answered – although on Monday evening in the ARD from 20.15 clock Jessy Wellmer in a documentary and then Louis Klamroth with his guests at “hart aber fair” had discussed it. Or had the round around Klamroth discussed it because Jessy Wellmer had made a reportage about German officials? And what was the question exactly? “Why do we still need officials?” asked “Hart but fair”. “Germany is currently debating about its 1.8 million civil servants”, so the “Tagesthemen” presenter Wellmer had justified her documentary. Practically, Wellmer also sat at the table at “Hart but fair” and simply said what she had already said and asked before. Two evening hours in the ARD for the civil servant state In the end, over these almost two evening hours that the ARD had dedicated to the German officials, one was not smarter, because the topic is too complex for a narrow talk show answer. But had heard many arguments very often – that you can not compare the statutory pension in Germany with a civil servant pension, for example. And then in the end, the question was whether it might have been more interesting this Monday evening to talk about the apocalyptic street riots and the political crisis in France. After all, it is the neighbor of this Germany. On the other hand, justice debates are always material for talk shows. Everyone can have a say. Everyone, like Louis Klamroth, had this one teacher who was always thought to be too comfortable? In short, it was feared that Klamroth, when he said this, still begins from the twelve weeks of vacation a year. “You can’t compare the systems” Underpinned with figures from an Infratest survey, which had been created exclusively, as Klamroth specifically mentioned, for Jessy Wellmer’s docu, the moderator then repeatedly addressed Volker Geyer, the Federal Chairman of the German Civil Servants’ Federation, to whom one could previously listen with Jessy Wellmer, how he insisted on not wanting to compare systems that cannot be compared. A quarter of respondents from the current Infratest study, for example, believe that teachers should no longer be civil servants. Rainer Brüderle from the FDP, formerly Federal Minister of Economic Affairs, thinks this is right. But Brüderle also thinks that teachers do not take on any official duties (unlike police or prison officials). Nicolas Schmelzer, on the other hand, a civil servant teacher and Tiktoker, would immediately go on strike if he were allowed, for example against the hygienic conditions in German schools and the shortage of staff – but he must not. Schmelzer also disagreed with Brüderle that it was a matter of authority for teachers to decide on the further lives of children by assigning them to secondary schools. In view of the “acute threat posed by extremists, especially on the right wing”, said the Hessian Interior Minister Roman Poseck (CDU), he was happy about the civil servant status, so the school is a “bulwark”, because governments could not simply prescribe what is taught there. At some point it dawned on you that the reason for the civil service debate might be the pension reform, but you had to put that together yourself. 84 percent of respondents had agreed to Infratest that civil servants should pay into the pension fund. But the pension commission does not recommend this exactly, recalled Interior Minister Poseck. So went the back and forth, for every privilege that civil servants enjoy (better secured in old age) a duty (can simply be transferred). Retired Bremen government director Elisabeth van der Wal was invited as a living example of a self-critical official. In the meantime, the chairman of the Federal Civil Service Association Geyer was allowed to say once again that the pension systems cannot be compared. And when the same Geyer dropped the fact that officials would live longer, Jessy Wellmer had a very good moment: Now everyone would wonder why this could be? But as often as she repeated this question radiantly, the actual moderator of the show, Louis Klamroth, unfortunately did not follow. So one more question remained open.