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Thread: French-German Border Shapes More Than Territory

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[quote=XIAOBAIHE,460737]While some Germans cross the border to work in France, few French do the same, except for seasonal labor at the large amusement park nearby, Europa-Park, the largest in Germany and the third-largest in Europe, which draws many French-speaking customers.

“We have job openings right now for 70 drivers of heavy trucks,” Mr. Mattusch said. “But the big problem is that the French don’t speak German,” so they cannot qualify for the jobs, and young people here no longer speak the Alsatian dialect, once used on both sides of the border. The mayor of Emmendingen, Stefan Schlatterer, says that “there is a job here for anyone who can count to ten,” but one needs to count in German.

Salaries on the German side are higher for similar work, goods are cheaper, the cost of hiring a full-time employee is lower and the relationship between German workers and their bosses is more supple and flexible, freer of the centralized regulations, ministries and unions characteristic of France.

But while the French may admire German rigor, they are reluctant to make some of the same sacrifices, including longer hours and less job security.

Boris Gourdial, director of the Freiburg branch of the German Federal Employment Agency, said that mentalities were different, despite shared history and proximity. “The French work to live and the Germans live to work,” he said, a cliché that still resonates.

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