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A political class that is concerned about its self-interest and even corruption, bloated and ambitious parliaments, a Kafkaesque bureaucracy, government finances that are getting out of hand and a central bank that prints money for the state to please its clientele - these ideas, which were previously associated with Italy, are becoming more and more popular as a description of the conditions developing in Germany.

In the past, many Italians hoped that order and stability would be imported from the European Union.

Today, "Italian conditions" are also here.

If our country does not see a jolt towards renewal soon, we will soon look at the German state as cynically and without hope as the Italians at theirs.

The corona pandemic has relentlessly exposed the deficits of German statehood.

Before that, one could smile at the old-fashioned, analogue office management, the inability of the Bundeswehr or the ailing state railways.

In the pandemic, however, the failure of the state costs human life and economic strength.

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The logical consequence would be to cut the state back to its core tasks, to modernize it in order to fulfill these tasks and otherwise to give more space to initiative in the private sector.

Instead, the majority of our politicians want to authorize the state to rebuild the economy, which has been shattered by endless lockdowns, according to a green master plan, and that at the European level too.

Italian history shows what to expect

In the European Union, the pandemic has removed the remaining barriers to financial irresponsibility.

The European Central Bank is now quite unabashedly procuring the euro area countries, especially in the south, the money to finance their gaping budget deficits.

The European Union takes on large debts, for which all states are liable, in order to provide transfers to those who complain the most.

The monetarily financed debt union, as it became a reality through the unification of very different regions in the Italian nation-state in the 19th century, has now arrived at the European level.

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Italian history shows what to expect.

Because it makes no sense in a debt and transfer union to save when others are splitting, the budget constraints fall.

Whoever lowers taxes for their citizens and increases government spending wins the most.

Since a state is not creditworthy without budget constraints, the central bank has to finance the deficits by creating money.

And since the money created to finance government deficits creates little economic added value, the currency expires.

The hope is: more market, less state

The bloated state apparatus nourishes a political caste that is mindful of its own advantages.

A sluggish bureaucracy makes life difficult for citizens and companies.

Small and medium-sized companies are looking for niches that promise protection from government access and are setting up there.

Bigger companies are leaving, and those who want to achieve something in their life are leaving.

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Those who stayed behind fluctuate between cynicism and resignation or place their hopes on populists who promise to smoke out the political establishment - until they have got hold of political benefices themselves.

Is there still hope?

Only if the next Federal Chancellor gives himself and the country a push towards a more market, less state and the limitation of a European Union that has become encroaching.

Thomas Mayer is founding director of the Flossbach von Storch Research Institute and professor at the University of Witten / Herdecke