Germany's parliament approves easing dual citizenship

If I was a nationalist in any country with roughly the demographic shape of Germany (so, most of the wealthy ones), I would regard open immigration as the highest possible leverage move, to the point, where I (not, in fact, being a nationalist) actually feel bad about the devastating effects this is ultimately going to have a few years down the line for the countries these people are leaving behind.

Bar an AI miracle, everyone is going to need bodies, and the bodies they are going to produce, to avoid societal breakdown. By current looks, it is potentially the scarcest resource of the future.

I understand that immigration of unskilled people is a little off from the "skilled immigration" pipe dream and less convenient, but are people really that confused about the slightly longer term and exponentially scarier cost of no immigration?

These countries have a system that, while not perfect, is the most excellent at creating skilled enough humans. Letting anyone willing and able to produce a child in the country, that you can then pump through that system, is the absolute cheapest and most realistic way you are ever going to get the amount of bodies you are going to need to avoid a total demographic disaster.

The alternative is eternally staying on a residence permit, and getting kicked out when you stop making money and paying taxes. It's not what I want, and the transactional relationship cuts both ways, but it gets you taxpayers with no strings attached.

However I want to be more than a worker. I want to build a life here and I'm getting really tired of the humiliating residence permit renewals at the dysfunctional immigration office.

Gulf states have awesome solution. You can go there and make money, never path to citizenship. If you are expat - you can make a lot of money and live well. If you are low skill laborer - well they can improve their conditions.

But I no see problem with importing people just to work, send money home and then send them back.

That is if you have an explicitly ethnic understanding of "the west" and Germany and, implicitly, that there is any kind of significant ethnic overlap between the west and Germany: there isn't. The west is made up of Anglos, Scots, French, Germans, Portuguese, Spaniards, Italians, and many hundreds of smaller cultural and ethnic groups which have spent the better part of the last 2000 years of european history trying to utterly annihilate each other (not to mention that larger "political west" which can include Japan, Korea, and other non-european liberal democracies).

Imagine going back in time and lamenting to the French people of the late 1800s that there aren't going to be enough Germans left. I don't think they'd react with the same sadness as you but rather breathe a sigh of relief. "The west" is an invention: what matters is the survival liberal democracy and the human race

Funny you should mention it; one of the election posters in Alexanderplatz is for the Partei für schulmedizinische Verjüngungsforschung ("Party for Biomedical Rejuvenation Research") — a single-issue political party in Germany that seeks to accelerate the development of medicine to reverse the aging process.

I can't vote here, but if I could, this is appealing.

(I might still not actually vote for them, it depends on the details of the voting system and single-issue parties like this in the UK seem to attract people that don't play well with others).

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Another solution is one I mention in half the threads around here on the topic "are AI companies evil copyright pirates?", where my comments revolve around asserting that any AI good enough to be economically disruptive is necessarily also good enough to be the kind of thing that a government can take ownership over in order to supply the means of production that enables a sustainable UBI alternative to the current economic paradigm.

The problem with Germany today is that the social state is archaic and has not been updated for the modern world. Unsurprising when the government still uses fax and snail mail for all communication.

This of course does not fix declining populations as a whole, but all advanced economies go through population decline almost like a rite of passage now. Unless growth is maintained, the system shrinks. Ultimately politicians and economists are more concerned with this over any other social ramifications of bringing migrants into the country. Obviously a balance needs to be struck, but Germany doesn't seem to be good at moderate and effective policy, e.g swinging from being a haven for refugees to now wanting to initiate mass deportations

This is not an "Everyone knows..."

Unfortunately, the major right-wing party wants to reduce immigration and actually remove German citizenship from non "native" Germans with multiple passports.

> Dual nationality is usually only allowed for citizens of other EU countries or Switzerland, although it is permitted for other immigrants in certain exceptional cases.

Yes, but that's the law as it's been, 1 exception is e.g. one can't renounce one's Turkish citizenship, so Turks granted a German citizenship become dual citizens. As far as I've read the changes will apply to children born with dual citizenships, not adults who want to gain the German one, AFAIK they (if they're not EU/Swiss) still have to renounce their old citizenship when able to.

Edit: OK according to this[1] the AFAIK above no longer applies now.

[1] https://www.juraforum.de/news/doppelte-staatsbuergerschaft-i...

It is mandatory for all German residents to have comprehensive health insurance which covers all treatment for any condition at any hospital with no deductibles.

Employees are eligible for a government scheme which delivers health insurance for a fixed proportion of your income, and covers all non-working spouses and children for free. You would however have to purchase private insurance for 4 people which complies with German requirements, which would cost a fortune, particuarly if any of you have any pre-existing conditions.

I think you also really don't know much about Germany if you think it is a good place to get by without learning the local language. German is such a widespread language that Germans can live their whole lives without having to have much contact with English, whereas in smaller countries films and books in English are widespread because it's not worthwhile dubbing/translating them.

For children Germany is ok, but you have to take into account that they must attend school (yes, home schooling may be a problem here). No shopping on Sundays, housing crisis, low level of digitalization, terrible weather in winter (at least in Berlin, which I assume you would prefer as an expat).

However Germans could already become dual citizens of a European Union country (and Switzerland) so many were covered under the old law (that will remain).

I hope one day humanity will surpass its empathic barrier of societies. It might be too much to hope for, I suppose.