YUROP

1414 readers

724 users here now

A laid back community for good news, pictures and general discussions among people living in Europe.

Other European communities

[email protected]

Other casual communities:

Language communities

Cities

Countries

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

-4

Germans... lazy?? They are now 40% more sick per year than a few years ago (www.euractiv.com)

submitted 17 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

12 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Germans call in sick more than 20 days per year on average, much more than workers in other EU countries.

Without the increase in sick days, the German economy could have grown by around 0.5% in 2023, instead of retracting by 0.3%, a study by pharma industry association vfa estimated last year.

top 12 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] [email protected] 3 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

Mental health days!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 12 hours ago

We call those weakdays

[–] [email protected] 12 points 15 hours ago

Oh! Won't someone think of the economy! /s

[–] [email protected] 12 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

How is it possible that an article so crudely mixes illness with laziness? On the other hand, if Germany hadn't taken such an arrogant attitude during the 2008 financial crisis, labeling all of Southern Europe as lazy and incompetent based on statistics like this, this news wouldn't feel so satisfying.

I don't believe that revenge will get us anywhere, but I can't help but crack a slight smile while reading it.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

I totally understand this feeling but let me tell you that German politicians are likewise using these numbers to label their own populace as lazy. So actually politicians don't seem to really care about nationality when they can smear someone and destruct the welfare state.

But maybe Germans deserve it a bit more lol.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 14 hours ago

No, they don’t deserve it—that’s the point. No population deserves to be treated that way as a whole. Politicians and the powerful, in general, will make you see others in whatever way suits them, whenever it suits them. Fifteen years ago, from the South, we tried to explain it in many ways, but back then, it seemed like the German population fell for their establishment’s trap (I suppose there would be all kinds of people, but at least a part of them did fall for it). Now, in the South, we know that’s all nonsense, and we don’t buy into it, even if at specific moments we say, ‘See? What you said about me can also be applied to you.’

The Germans lazy? No one would say that, at least for all the Germans. A little less flexible to improvise than in the south and throwing arrogants about the quality of their work, but nobody would say lazy

[–] [email protected] 2 points 16 hours ago

Germans itt: NEIN We ARE NOT LAZY

[–] [email protected] 35 points 16 hours ago

We've switched to eAU (Elektronische Arbeitsunfähigkeitsbescheinigung / electronic sick certificate). This was done on paper before and a lot of cases were missing in the statistics. So the increase in sick days could be explained by better / accurate statistics instead of people actually being sick more.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

It might also be related to the German national sport of faking statistics and wanking over meaningless numbers, because the reporting requirements for sick days have recently changed. Of course, the press will use this to shit on workers' rights.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Also, being sick is not being lazy.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 16 hours ago

According to most employers and politicians, (who, surely by sheer coincidence, have never done any honest work in their life) it is.