Germany needs 500,000+ immigrants every year till 2050

March 27, 2015

A new study has just been published by the Bertelsmann Stiftung:

Zuwanderungsbedarf aus Drittstaaten in Deutschland bis 2050

Press Release: Without immigrants, the potential labor force would sink from approximately 45 million today to less than 29 million by 2050 – a decline of 36 percent. This gap cannot be closed without immigration. Even if women were to be employed at the same rate as men, and the retirement age was increased to 70 in 2035, the number of potential workers in the country would rise by only about 4.4 million.

In 2013, a total of 429,000 more people came to Germany than left the country. Last year, the net total was 470,000, the Federal Statistical Office reports. According to the study, net immigration at this level would be sufficient for at least the next 10 years to keep the country’s potential labor force at a constant level. From that time onward, however, the need for immigrants will grow, because the baby-boomer generation will be entering retirement. One out of two of today’s skilled workers with professional training will have left the working world by 2030. …

….. the current high levels of immigration from EU countries (2013: around 300,000) will soon decline significantly, as demographic change is shrinking populations across the European Union, and because incentives to emigrate in crisis-stricken countries will decline with economic recovery. The experts forecast an annual average of just 70,000 immigrants or fewer from EU counties by 2050. For this reason, efforts to attract skilled workers from non-EU countries should be intensified. …

German working population development

German working population development – Bertelsmann Stiftung

This is not a picture that is unique to Germany in Europe. Moreover just keeping the working population constant does not allow for the additional numbers who are ageing and whose “pensions” whether from the Sate of from private sources must be supported by a corresponding growth in the resource funds.

All politicians are well aware of the demographic inevitabilities in Europe. But they have not yet managed to convince all their constituencies that “old Europe” has to renew and reinvent itself. A “new Europe” cannot hark back to the days of the Crusades. Few, if any, politicians in today’s Europe and on the right of the divide, have had the courage to point out that immigration from outside the EU is necessary and that these immigrants must be speedily integrated. Few of the politicians on the left of the divide have either had the courage to point out that a multiethnic society still requires a single over-riding culture (set of values) which may then have as many subordinate cultures as desired. Few have had the courage to point out that “multiculturalism” does not allow a single society to be sustained. If these politicians truly want to take care of their children’s children they will have to come to terms with the reality of the cold hand of demographics. The only alternative to immigration – but hardly viable – is a Europe-wide “baby production” policy which would have to discourage abortions and maximise incentives for having children. Fertility clinics and multiple births could always be heavily subsidised.

But I can’t help feeling that EU immigration policy cannot be just based on “asylum seekers”. Any such policy must be built on demographic realities and must be based on needed skills (and on the provision of training in the needed skills) and not just on “asylum seekers” and the random set of skills that that represents.

EU 2009 Ageing Report:

…. low birth rates, rising life expectancy and continuing inflow of migrants can be expected to result in an almost unchanged, but much older, total EU population by 2060, meaning that the EU would move from having four working-age people (aged 15-64) for every person aged over 65 to a ratio of only two to one. The largest decrease is expected to occur during the period 2015-35 when the baby-boom cohorts will be entering retirement. …….

The fiscal impact of ageing is therefore projected to be substantial in almost all Member States, becoming apparent already over the course of the next decade. Overall, on the basis of current policies, age-related public expenditure is projected to increase on average by about 4¾ percentage points of GDP by 2060 in the EU and by more than 5 percentage points in the euro area – especially through pension, healthcare and long-term care spending.

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German Wings 4U9525: Why this rush to judgement?

March 26, 2015

Ever since the French prosecutor’s press conference this morning, there has been a rush to judgement and the guilt of Andreas Lubitz is taken as being proved beyond any doubt. It may well be so but the rush leaves me feeling a little uncomfortable. There has even been a competition in the media to use ever more sensational adjectives. “Mass murderer” and “killer” are common. But what the French prosecutor actually said is:

According to Marseille prosecutor Brice Robin, Lubitz acted “for a reason we cannot fathom right now but which looks like intent to destroy this aircraft. He voluntarily … allowed the loss of altitude of the plane, which he had no reason to do. He had … no reason to stop the pilot-in-command from coming back into the cockpit. He had no reason to refuse to answer to the air controller who was alerting him on the loss of altitude,” 

Maybe there are no other alternatives and all the conclusions being reached are perfectly justified. Maybe the sounds of his breathing which are being used to state that he was fully conscious and breathing normally are absolutely conclusive. Maybe there was no possibility that he could have been incapacitated and still have that breathing pattern. Maybe his 5 month break from his training for what a friend has called “depression and burn-out” is conclusive proof – as the media seem to assume – that he was mentally disturbed.

Maybe.

Now the assumption of his guilt itself will colour the consideration of any mechanical fault or any other possibility.

I would have preferred to have seen a more considered elimination of all other alternatives before this unseemly rush to judgement. Rushing to name him the killer and the mass-murderer will not help any of the victims. But it could lead to incomplete investigations of other relevant areas.

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UK Election 2015: Cameron as a duck to Miliband’s poodle but who is the jackal and who the hyena?

March 26, 2015

Yesterday was the last Prime Minister’s Question Time (PMQ) in the UK House of Commons before the general election and it lived up to my entertainment expectations. Miliband called Cameron a “lame duck” for his off-hand comment that he would not want a third term as PM. Since Cameron hasn’t even won a second term, the duck comparison is a little early. (I suppose if he wins he will be as much of a lame duck as Obama was when he won his second term).

In any event Cameron replied spiritedly. He first also called Miliband a duck hanging on to Salmond’s coattails but then called him Salmond’s “poodle”. This went down much better with his supporter’s. Everybody remembers Tony Blair being George Bush’s poodle in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Considering the UK general election as a menagerie is quite interesting. In addition to Cameron the duck and Miliband the poodle, we would get Nigel Farage as the jackal hunting for scraps and Alex Salmond as the ultimate scavenger in the shape of a hyena ready to eat anything. Nick Clegg would then be a chameleon changing colour as and when necessary and Natalie Bennett would be the Green slug, slip-streaming behind the chameleon.

UK2015 menagerie

UK 2015 menagerie

 

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German Wings 4U9525: Was cockpit security just too secure?

March 26, 2015

UPDATE:

A French prosecutor has now said that the pilot in the cockpit disabled the code (usually 7 digits) which would have allowed the pilot outside to override the door lock and come in, and that the plane was crashed deliberately!

The New York Times and AFP are reporting that the cockpit recordings show:

  • Normal conversation between the pilots initially
  • sound of a chair being pushed back and one pilot leaving the cockpit (toilet visit perhaps?)
  • knocking and then pounding on the door as he tried to get back in
  • no response from the pilot left inside

And that suggests that maybe, and as a very unhappy coincidence, the pilot left inside fell ill or was otherwise incapacitated while his colleague was outside.

Which would suggest that security arrangements where the cockpit door can only be opened from the inside have not been entirely thought through. The security prevents anyone rescuing or taking over from a lone incapacitated pilot locked inside the cockpit.

NYTimes:

A senior military official involved in the investigation described “very smooth, very cool” conversation between the pilots during the early part of the flight from Barcelona, Spain, to Düsseldorf, Germany. Then the audio indicated that one of the pilots left the cockpit and could not re-enter.

“The guy outside is knocking lightly on the door, and there is no answer,” the investigator said. “And then he hits the door stronger, and no answer. There is never an answer.”

He said, “You can hear he is trying to smash the door down.” ……..

…….. The data from the voice recorder seems only to deepen the mystery surrounding the crash and provides no indication of the condition or activity of the pilot who remained in the cockpit. The descent from 38,000 feet over about 10 minutes was alarming but still gradual enough to indicate that the twin-engine Airbus A320 had not been damaged catastrophically. At no point during the descent was there any communication from the cockpit to air traffic controllers or any other signal of an emergency.

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Colour police crack down on “unswedish” colours

March 24, 2015

You don’t have to be a politician to be an idiot, but it helps.

Local politicians in Mjölby don’t like the colour an artist has painted his house and have ordered him to repaint it because the colour is unswedish!!

The Colour Police

Anders Steen Chairman of Mjölby’s colour police

TheLocal: Bernth Uhno, an artist who has frequently exhibited his own paintings and etchings across Sweden, recently bought and repainted a house that had been empty since 1981. …. However his taste proved too radical for local councillors who argued his colour scheme was too outlandish and ordered him to repaint it in a more suitable shade. “The colour scheme is not Swedish,” Anders Steen, a Centre Party politician who is chair of the town’s building committee told local television news network, ……

The House

Wrong Colour. This house is to be “inspected” by the local Building Committee in Skänninge. Photo karl-johan norén (via Corren)

The cat likes it.

 

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Scots lost the referendum but may soon be ruling England

March 24, 2015

The 2015 UK General Election is only about 6 weeks away and is turning out to be much more interesting – and entertaining – than I had anticipated. It was in September last year that independence for Scotland from the United Kingdom was rejected – in the event much more decisively than was generally expected – but not the overwhelming rejection that was first anticipated when the referendum was agreed to by the UK Parliament. (55.3% No against 44.7% Yes). The Scottish National Party (SNP) was the main driver for the referendum and for independence and their leader Alex Salmond had to step down as party leader with a bloody nose.

But now with the elections just weeks away, the Labour party has collapsed in Scotland (where the Conservatives are already almost extinct), UKIP has risen in England and the Liberal Democrats have become schizophrenic and irrelevant. The natural party for the Liberal Democrats to cooperate with in 2010 would have been Labour. But since that would not have given an overall majority, they went to bed instead with their natural and historic enemy  – the Conservatives. Which of course lies at the root of their current schizophrenia and the defection of their left wing to the Greens.

The most likely scenario now is that the Scots (via SNP) will effectively be ruling England after the election. Of course the SNP will not be the governing party but they may well be the determining voice in a minority Labour government. And since the SNP is generally further to the left of mainstream Labour, it will help to empower Labour’s more extreme members and may even help to bring in the support of some of the old communists. We could have an ironic – and highly entertaining – situation in the next Parliament. UKIP and the Conservatives could be desperately fighting for the devolution of England and a separate English parliament. Of course they would be no chance of any referendum on EU membership. The English (UKIP, Conservatives, Lib Dems) may have to plead (with SNP and Labour) for a referendum by 2020 for English devolution.

Of course there are many possible outcomes and 6 weeks is an eternity in an election campaign but the numbers provide the entertainment.

  1. Current Parliament (650 seats, 326 needed for majority)
  2. Conservatives 307, Liberal Democrats 57 (coalition 364)
  3. Labour 258, Irish DUP 8, SNP 6, others 14.

But a “very possible” result now is that the next parliament will be totally hung. The only working majority even remotely possible will be with the SNP and Labour together – though it may not be an absolute majority. Paradoxically, this could be a stronger mandate for the SNP both in Scotland and in the UK than any independence could have brought. For the Conservatives there is no redemption with the Lib Dems or with UKIP. They would have to gain seats in England compared to 2010 to prevent this or some similar scenario. And that does not look likely. Based on one forecast model, it could look like this:

UK 2015 possible

UK 2015 possible

So Alex Salmond leading a “Red” Ed Miliband even further left – and surely by the nose – is entirely possible. Scotland could effectively become a “one party democracy”. Perhaps Alex Salmond could emulate Lee Kwan Yew (though he does not quite have the same vision or intellectual stature)! Unlike Lee Kwan Yew, who never had a direct say in the Malaysian parliament, Salmond could extract his full pound (kilogram) of flesh in the UK Parliament. Labour would not be able to achieve any legislation, even if it was just for England, without the Scots.

Maybe the Scots will – of their goodness – eventually allow the English a devolution referendum.

(The hung parliament may well be “democracy in action” but it will also be a manifestation of “levelling down” to the lowest common level. And the lowest common level excludes any possibility of excellence).

Some interesting times ahead!

 

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Lee Kwan Yew: A case of a wise, benevolent dictatorship achieving what democracy could not

March 23, 2015

I have great admiration for what Lee Kwan Yew achieved for Singapore and for Singaporeans as a virtual dictator. I do not see that any “open democracy” could have achieved anything remotely similar. He became Prime Minister in 1959, campaigned for the merger with Malaysia which took place in 1963 and then oversaw the separation from Malaysia in 1965. He stepped down in 1990 and continued as an advisory “Senior Minister” till 2004 and then as “Minister Mentor” till 2011. He was effectively the Dictator of Singapore for over 40 years. The comparisons with Malaysia provide a picture of what “democracy” would not have brought – and could not have brought – to Singapore.

As part of a “democratic” Malaysia, the ethnic-Chinese would have been stifled by the Malays and their success would have rankled and they would have been constrained if not repressed. It would have been a case of oppression of a very able minority by a much less capable majority as is the case in Malaysia today. The separation from Malaysia ensured that the ethnic-Chinese majority in Singapore were not stifled by being a minority in Malaysia. That, with Lee’s vision, provided a lift not only for themselves but also for the Malaysian economy.

The one thing I feel that escaped him was the establishment of a pluralistic democracy to succeed him. If he had ensured that he could only be succeeded by equally able dictators, it would not matter.

Lee Kwan Yew built Singapore. He also put in place all the trappings of a multi-party democracy but was effectively the benevolent dictator who controlled every aspect of life for over 40 years (31 years officially as Prime Minister and for a decade afterwards).

But the institutions he set up for legislative representation and the judiciary are all somewhat nullified when the current reality is one of a single party, ruling in a quite authoritarian style under the cloak of a pluralistic democracy. The ruling party has been quite ruthless in using legalities and a compliant judiciary to exclude rival political parties as soon as they begin to show any signs of becoming popular.

What he leaves behind is a one-party “democracy”, “but Lee Kwan Yew’s legacy will not be so easily  overturned when the majority perceive – as they do – that they have it “pretty good”  and maintaining the status quo is far better than the uncertain benefits of an increased level of freedom”.

This is not meant to be an obituary for Lee Kwan Yew. There are plenty of those: here and here for example. What his death reminds me is that there is nothing intrinsically wrong with a dictatorship as a political system. And it is not certain that any democracy must be “better” than a dictatorship. In fact I am inclined to think that any democracy needs subordinated “dictatorships” to be able to function.

In any situation where there are many courses of action, there has to be a course of action that is “best”. The “best” course of action – by any definition – in any type of society or gathering of humans is – per force – a minority view. A “democracy” in any gathering gives no assurance that the “best” actions will guide or lead that gathering – only that the majority view will prevail. It can only be a very rare coincidence that the “majority view” coincides with the “best view” of actions to be taken. Every corporate manager is required to be something of a dictator. It is his selection which determines whether he is one of the “best” for the situation he is to manage. The good managers are those dictators who lead and manage to carry their constituencies along. The US President is given some dictatorial powers for the duration of his term. It is the selection of the President which must determine whether he is any good but the democratic process does not necessarily select the “best”. It is the fundamental weakness of democracies that the “majority views” which prevail have no necessary connection to the “correct view” or the “best view”.

Maybe Lee Kwan Yew was just an accident – the right person for the times. But he surely was a wise and benevolent dictator. So I am led to conclude that while democracies avoid the worst they will almost never provide the best. Democracies are great levellers – but they level down. Like evolution, they do not drive towards excellence; they settle for the “good enough”. It is with a dictatorship – however constrained – that one may get a chance for the best.

 

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Swedish King rides to the rescue of the damsel Minister in distress?

March 22, 2015

Swedish foreign policy has blundered badly by not analysing or understanding the Saudi Arabian reaction to the “morally superior” and sanctimonious statements made by the Swedish Foreign Minister about the status of “human and women’s rights” in the Kingdom. The debacle is transforming into high farce as the Swedish King – who has no powers at all – offers to ride to the rescue.

In a most unusual statement, the Swedish King, Carl XVI Gustaf, has offered his “help to contribute in finding a solution to the situation”. The Swedish monarch has no political powers whatsoever but felt compelled to say something as the crisis with Saudi Arabia and the Arab world created by the Foreign Minister, Margot Wallström, continues to escalate. While more Arab countries are expressing their condemnation of Wallströms ill-judged  statements, even the Danish government has indicated that they feel she went too far.

TheLocal.se: The king is seemingly distressed about Sweden’s escalating spat with Saudi Arabia. The row began when Saudi Arabia blocked Wallström’s speech on democracy and human rights as a guest of honour addressing the Arab League, and resulted in Sweden limiting its military ties with the Saudis.

Tensions heightened when Saudi Arabia responded by recalling its ambassador to Stockholm and announced it would not issue any new visas for Swedish business people.

On Saturday, the royal palace announced that the king would meet Sweden’s top diplomat on Monday “to help contribute in finding a solution to the situation”. The king also said that: “It’s important to have a good dialogue and good relations between countries,” but noted that he hadn’t been in contact with the Saudi royals.

In Saudi Arabia, the Justice Minister has also added his voice to the wide-spread Arab condemnation of  Wallström’s statements.

ArabNews: Justice Minister Walid Al-Samaani strongly condemned recent statements from foreign parties targeting the country’s judicial system. ….. 

Al-Samaani’s statement came in the backdrop of Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom’s pronouncements against the Kingdom’s Shariah laws that led Saudi Arabia to recall its envoy to Stockholm. The minister said that such accusations are unwarranted and uncalled for, since the Saudi law is derived from the Book of Allah and the teachings and practices of His Prophet (peace be upon him). 

The Saudi law, the minister emphasized, guarantees the dignity of all its citizens irrespective of race, religion, sex and language. “Everybody before our law is equal,” he reiterated.

 

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A prosecutor who admits lying to influence opinion and the outcome of a trial

March 21, 2015

A trial in the media run in parallel to a trial in court is becoming – for both defence and prosecution – a necessary way of influencing the atmosphere in which the legal process is carried out.

Ajmal Kasab was the baby-faced terrorist who participated in the 26/11/2008 Mumbai bombings, was convicted on 80 charges in 2010 and was executed on 21st November 2012.

On 3 May 2010, Kasab was found guilty of 80 offences, including murder, waging war against India, possessing explosives, and other charges. On 6 May 2010, the same trial court sentenced him to death on four counts and to a life sentence on five counts. Kasab’s death sentence was upheld by the Bombay High Court on 21 February 2011. The verdict was upheld by the Supreme Court of India on 29 August 2012. Kasab was hanged on 21 November 2012 at 7:30 a.m. and buried at Yerwada Jail in Pune.

A remarkably rapid legal process by Indian standards. The speed of the process was undoubtedly influenced by public opinion and the outrage that the attack had generated. However sensationalised media reports during 2009, about Kasab’s “tears”, his assumed emotions and his apparent remorse during the trial created some sympathy especially among those opposed to the death penalty. This sympathy wave was then followed by a counter-wave in the media where it was reported that a remorseless Kasab was demanding “mutton biriyani”!  “Why feed terrorists biryani?” became a catch phrase and the trial process was even further speeded up.

But the biriyani story was entirely concocted by the Special Prosecutor who disseminated it in the media. He admitted this himself at a conference this week on counter-terrorism in Jaipur. He had taken it upon himself to mould public opinion such that his own case in court could be favourably influenced:

Economic Times: 26/11 Mumbai terror attack accused Ajmal Kasab’s demand for mutton biryani in jail was just a myth and was “concocted” to stop an “emotional wave” which was being created in favour of the militant, claimed Ujjwal Nikam, public prosecutor in the case.

“Kasab never demanded biryani and was never served by the government. I concocted it just to break an emotional atmosphere which was taking shape in favour of Kasab during the trial of the case,” Nikam told reporters on the sidelines of international conference on counter-terrorism.

Ujjwal Nikam is a high profile lawyer who – even when a trial is ongoing and is presumably sub judice – has few qualms about talking to the media. Already in 2009, he was being criticised by other lawyers about his propensity to prosecute his cases in the media:

Indian Express: Published on:July 28, 2009

Special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam has come under criticism from his own legal fraternity over what they allege his attempts to conduct trial outside the court for the 26/11 Mumbai attacks.

Around 20 lawyers at a meeting in the city passed a resolution criticising Nikam and advising him not to sit on judgment in the case before the final verdict is out. A copy of the resolution has been sent to the State Government,urging it to put a gag on Nikam in order to maintain the fairness of the trial.

“Some of the comments made by the special public prosecutor during his briefings to the media are objectionable and do not reflect the seriousness of the trial. You get the feeling that he is conducting a trial outside the court when he should actually be taking up those points before the judge and not before the media,” said advocate Sushil Mancharkar,who was present at the meeting.

But I don’t suppose that Ujjwal Nikam is going to change his methods of conducting his prosecutions in the media as an enhancement to his prosecutions in court. Especially, as has been fairly obvious in the recent Delhi rape cases, trials in court are not immune to public opinion.

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We missed the eclipse (in its totality)

March 20, 2015

It has been overcast with low cloud and a drizzle all day. The sky has remained the same dull, diffuse, even. grey with no sign of any letting up.

And so we missed the great theatrics that were taking place above the cloud as the moon danced around the earth and obscured the sun. That the theatrics took place is entirely a matter of faith because under the thick cloud cover it was not even possible to discern in which quarter the sun lay – let alone whether any eclipse was taking place.

Totality as seen above the Faeroe Islands (screenshot of BBC film)

Totality over the Faeroe Islands (BBC)

 

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