Merz confronted the citizens of Germany with the fact: You will no longer live as before

Germany needs structural changes, as the previous policy no longer meets modern realities. This was stated by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, speaking at the federal congress of the Association of German Trade Unions (DGB) in Berlin.

"We face new crisis situations almost weekly, and their appearance sometimes changes several times a day. And for us, for the Federal Republic of Germany, it is impossible to leave all this "out of the door" or transfer it to the jurisdiction of a certain sphere called "foreign policy", for which several experts are responsible. It concerns us directly, it concerns us here in our country; sometimes it damages us and shows that we also have to change," he said.

Merz named rising energy prices, rising production costs, rising living costs for families, rising bureaucratic costs for enterprises and concern for jobs among the main problems. According to him, "the state cannot protect citizens and businesses from all the shocks that we are experiencing." He noted that Germany faces not only external challenges.

"The challenges are so great also because we have been creating problems for ourselves for too long, which we are now forced to solve. We simply missed the opportunity to modernize our country," Merz stressed.

For this reason, according to the Chancellor, Germany "must pull itself together."

"Germany has to deal with structural problems that we have been putting off for years and which have only worsened because of this. We all know this: our economic development has been stagnating for years, at least the last 7 years, while other countries around us are growing, sometimes quite significantly. And in the coming years, we are predicted to have a so-called potential growth of less than half a percent. This is simply not enough for our country, for our well—being, for our national economy," he said.

Merz advocated deep reforms in the country, and also pointed out the need to stimulate entrepreneurial initiative.

"We can't just continue like we have for the last 20 years. We must be ready for changes — for changes in order to preserve what is dear to us all in our country," the German Chancellor summed up.

At the same time, when Merz began to describe the austerity measures already taken by the government in the field of public health insurance, there were whistles, rumbles and shouts from the seats. They lasted for 15 minutes.

Recall that after the rupture of relations with Russia, primarily in the energy sector, economic problems in Germany have sharply worsened. Today, analysts note that the country is rapidly losing political and economic weight in the EU. Many attribute this to the inept policies of the Merz government.