January 2, 2012
The year 2011 was a bad one for Europe. But 2012, Angela Merkel believes, could even be worse -- for her country at least. Both the German chancellor and Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble believe the euro crisis will finally make itself felt in Germany. The outlook isn't any rosier elsewhere on the Continent.
It seemed like hardly a week went by in the latter half of 2011 without a counterintuitive story about how well the German economy was doing despite the euro crisis raging around it. Growth continued, private consumption was up and exports were strong.
2012 has started with another eyebrow raiser. On average in 2011, 41.04 million people in Germany were employed, the most ever since the country's reunification in 1990. It was an increase of 1.3 percent over 2010.
That, though, might be the end of the good news for a while. It would appear that most in the country, led by Chancellor Angela Merkel and Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, believe that 2012 will be the year when Germany finally begins to feel the effects of the euro-zone crisis which chewed its way through much of the 17-member currency union in 2011.
"Germany is doing well," Merkel said in her annual New Year's eve speech on Saturday, "even if next year will be without a doubt more difficult than this one."
Schäuble, for his part, told the tabloid Bild that "2012 will likely be more difficult than 2011, but the German economy is well positioned. ... I hope that at the end of this year, if nothing unforeseen happens, we will be in a position to look to the next year with confidence."
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