East Germany given R15 trillion since Wall fell: study
November 8, 2009
United Germany transferred some 1.3 trillion euros (R15 trillion) to the former communist east in the years after the fall of the Berlin Wall to help prop up the depressed region, a study published Sunday showed.
The Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH) in the east of the country said the huge sum (1.9 trillion dollars), spent between 1991 and 2005, had largely gone toward social welfare payments for easterners.
The study, published in the Welt am Sonntag newspaper, came as Germany prepares to celebrate Monday the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall in a peaceful revolution that ended communist rule.
IWH President Ulrich Blum said only about 10 percent of the subsidies had gone to measures intended to spur economic growth versus about 67 percent for social welfare benefits.
"The fact that the transfers increased rather than decreased in the last few years shocked us," Blum told the Welt am Sonntag.
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said he expected lingering economic inequality between the poorer eastern states and richer west since national unification in 1990 to largely disappear in another 10 years.
"There is no longer any reason for feelings of inferiority" among easterners, he told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper.
Transport and construction minister Peter Ramsauer was quoted in the Welt am Sonntag calling for more investment in infrastructure in the west after the deluge of aid for the east.
"In the last two decades, we have neglected to invest in roads and rails" in the west, he said. "Now the time has come to make up for what we have failed to do." - AFP
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