Debate article: Berlin Wall: "The gap between east and west continues - still after thirty years"

"It can only get better!" It can only get better!

Those words repeated Elisabeth in broad Saxon, a young middle-aged woman, whom I met in Dresden during the transitional period while the fall of the wall and the unification of Germany. She hated "the reds" and was glad they lost their power.

However, the euphoria after the memorable day, which is celebrated for the thirtieth time this year, quickly settled down. Western investors, the so-called "rock men", seized the "fillets" in the East German cadaver.

The violent transition created existential anxiety and frustration among many DDR residents, their soaring expectations were not met.

Workplaces were closed down, properties went to their former owners, many could not afford to buy very much in the sudden commodity stores, which were established on the fly. It even led to people taking their lives, writes Klaus Behring in a book about suicide in East Germany after the unification.

Elisabeth was one of them. Her small vegetable shop, a private niche in the Socialist GDR, went bankrupt when the street outside was paved. And the vegetables were more convenient for consumers to buy at Aldi or Kaisers.

The gap between east and west persisted, although it slowly narrowed until this year. The roads became better, the product range became larger, residential buildings were renovated. A lot has been built in the cities, as anyone can see when visiting the former GDR.

But even at the end of 2017, the difference in average income from west to east was considerable. While in the western states it stands at EUR 3,339, in the eastern states it is only EUR 2,600, the German Ministry of Labor notes.

That means a difference of almost 30 percent, and it can apply to exactly the same job.

In addition, there are the drivers of industrial growth, especially in former West Germany, where the richest states are located. An aging population, aided by younger migrants to the West, is making its appearance, even though pensions are actually lower in the East than in the West.

After these complaints, it is appropriate to modify the misery. According to the latest measurements by the Statista Research Department, more East Germans are unemployed than West Germans. While it now stands at 4.8% for the whole of Germany, East Germany is over-represented with its 6.1% unemployed.

But if the measurements can be compared, that figure is not that much higher than in Sweden. And the average income in some eastern states is actually on a par with some regions in France and England. The Dresden area, in which Elisabeth lived, is now comparable to Greater Manchester.

However, according to Statista, some opinion figures are surprising.

In a recent survey of how the East Germans look back on the GDR, 8% say that the GDR had predominantly bad sides, 32% more bad pages than good, as much as 49% that the GDR had more good sides than bad and 8% that the GDR had predominantly good sides. And this so far after the fall of the wall.

In a survey by the Forza opinion institute, 8% of East Berliners wanted to keep the wall. It is not much, but today there are many who praise the AfD, Germany's equivalent of SD.

The latest elections reflect a European trend. The big middle parties CDU and the Social Democrats are going back to the favor of the parties on the outskirts, especially the xenophobic AfD. Nowadays, it is big days for right-wing populists, and the former GDR is a fertile soil.