It's about time
#3
Hi Gnollguy,

just a few words about the economic impact you wrote about:

As it probably is in America, quite a lot of the military bases are in areas that are rather scarcely populated. So, a lot of these towns more or less built their economy around their guests, the soldiers. If the soldiers go away, bad luck; lot's of jobs are going to be lost in those towns.

Two examples, first one being the little town of Elmpt, which about every german will be unable to find on a map*g*. Little hint: Close to the Dutch border.
There used to be an RAF airbase there, and you could find quite a lot of stores, bigger and smaller there, than would have been the norm for such a rather small town (don't know how many people live there, but I'd say around 25.000 maximum). So, there were LOTS of eating places, LOTS of car dealers and stores of various kinds. When the RAF forces went away, the tone became pretty much of a ghost town... Big mistake to bet all your money on one horse, but I guess in the 60's it must have seemed to be a good idea.

Second example, Bitburg (that's where Bitburger comes from, for the beer drinkers here). Also a rather small town pretty much in the middle of nowhere. They have a big brewery there, the aforementioned Bitburger Brauerei, and they have the Bitburg AFB nearby, and that's what the people in Bitburg pretty much do for a living; they work in the big brewery or in jobs related to their US guests. Eating places, drinking places, McDonald's, the like. They even had a big "Erlebnisbad" built two or three years ago, that's a swimming pool with slides, wild water rides and the like. Sorry, don't know the corresponding word in English.
So, if the Air Force went away, Bitburg would also have a big economical problem, since quite a lot of jobs would be lost, and the visitors to their Erlebnisbad wouldn't be nearly as numerous as before.

Just on a side note: I know the article says that most units to be withdrawn from Germany will be Army, and I write about Air Force bases, but the principle holds, I guess.

Also, at the moment, there is a political problem that amplifies the "withdrawal problem" here: The cities and counties (Bundesländer) in Germany have to take over new functions that were to this date carried out by the central government. This for example means that Arbeitslosengeld (money for unemployed people) will now be paid by the cities and communities, for which they will need funds. But the compensation coming from the central government now looks to be less than what they have to pay. So, the cities have less money in their pocket, and if the Army forces leave those cities, they will really have a hard time.

OTOH, I think this will be quite a problem for those cities with big army bases, but it will not have that much of an effect on economy. Bad for the little guy living there, but nothing really bad. I guess that's life.

Hope I could give you a few helpful ideas!

Take care,
Lord_Olf
"I don't like to brag, I don't like to boast, but I like hot butter on my breakfast toast!" - Flea
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Messages In This Thread
It's about time - by Occhidiangela - 03-25-2004, 03:08 PM
It's about time - by Kevin - 03-26-2004, 12:17 AM
It's about time - by Lord_Olf - 03-26-2004, 08:50 AM
It's about time - by Lord_Olf - 03-26-2004, 09:01 AM
It's about time - by Kevin - 03-26-2004, 01:38 PM
It's about time - by Moldran - 03-26-2004, 02:15 PM
It's about time - by Occhidiangela - 03-26-2004, 02:39 PM
It's about time - by --Pete - 03-26-2004, 03:57 PM

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