Germany is not known for modern eGovernment.** It's politicians and think tanks repeat the need to modernize government during every speech, at every conference. What little eGovernment there is, suffers from the most basic of traditional shortcomings, for example, a conspicuous lack of automated notifications.
Lagging behind small countries like Estonia and Sweden in this regard makes German "elites" queasy and quick to blame something, anything, for instance, data protection rules. Or various evil Silicon Valley based companies.
The truth is complex but much of the reluctance to modernize government is deeply rooted in the tightly woven bureaucratic fabric of the country. The place is so tightly governed that the news of a woman living and working under a false name without being discovered for 30 years sent a shock wave through the country. How can that happen, asked the media for several news cycles.
If you are from a country where government is more sloppy, or "less efficient", you will appreciate the simple pleasure of quiet efficiency. Just hope that they never make a serious mistake.
Because the flip side of German style rule is that officials have an even harder time to acknowledge mistakes than in a known chaotic system and that you have to invest so much more effort into simply making yourself heard.
Of the many strokes of bureaucratic genius we have come across in this sedate country, the blogster would like to mention two that show German government can do IT quite well when it wants.
And without raising much alarm about the surveillance implications of a measure.
That's the real genius. Well, the Italians beat the Germans to this one, but still.
As the first example, take the national vehicle database. If you have never heard of it, rest assured that even most Germans don't think of the database as a "national vehicle database". What they think of is: the motor vehicle tax is collected by the customs agency.
Sold to the public as a measure to simply the collection of vehicle tax, the status of the tax was changed from a state tax to a federal tax in 2009. To the tax payer, there was no visible change for the next five years. The tax continued to be collected by the respective state tax board.
In 2014, collection was transferred to German customs. Sixteen different state databases were normalized and merged into a single one. Since nobody is perfect, about 100 000 records were not imported correctly and had to be fixed manually, but that was it.
Had a German government declared it wanted a national vehicle database, there would have been protest.
Then there is the "national ID number". Germany has traditionally demanded to know where residents live, and it has one of the most comprehensive mandatory registration laws on the planet. If you move within the country or leave, you need to show up at town hall/city hall and register or face a fine.
Still, they did not have a national ID number. The closest they came to it was a social security number, but this was not mandatory.
So, knowing how they got themselves an immensely valuable national vehicle database, how would you go about if you wanted to create a national ID?
Congratulations if you answered "something with taxes".
You could start by calling it "Tax Identification Number" (German: steuerliche Identifikationsnummer, or Steuer-IdNr. for short). Introduction of such an ID was controversial for several reasons.
Foremost among them was a failed attempt in 1973 (West Germany) to introduce an "Individual identification number". The name alone was supremely bad PR in the rebellious 70s and barely a generation after the end of the most control-freaky German government in all of history. The West German constitutional court nixed the project.
East Germany, less bothered because model socialist citizens obviously understood its value, did introduce an ID under the same name "Individual identification number".
In the face of the double whammy of negative precedent, the successful introduction of the tax ID in 2007 is quite an achievement.
If you cannot pass a law to introduce a unique national ID because it is against the constitution, how can you fix the problem?
Something with taxes, right, but you can't make a new law for that either because opponents, calling the concept a "big brother" idea would go to court and likely win.
Enter the European Union. The EU had recently published a directive on the taxation of interest from capital gains. Implementing that directive did not require a new law but could be done by simple administrative decree.
This is exactly how the Germans did it. Every citizen and resident was assigned a unique, perpetual ID.
Babies get one at birth.
The ID for the newborn arrives in the mail, typically within two weeks from birth to ensure the little one cannot rack up too much untaxed capital gains interest.
To deflect the expected legal challenge, you add language to the decree that sounds as if there is only a narrow scenario of use cases: for the exchange of financial information only.
It worked. Court challenges failed.
Never mind that financial information is part of almost every criminal investigation.
Also, remember the mandatory registration at town hall?
You also have to provide your tax ID when you register, and the registration data is then run against the national tax ID database to detect people who try to register in more than one location.
But, don't forget, this is only meant to ensure you pay tax on interest on capital gains.
Plenty of other goodies exist, for example, a national register of telecommunications subscribers (the last loophole of pre-paid SIM cards is being closed as we write), and a national register of foreign nationals living in Germany.
** Yes, they do have online tax filing now. Many years after the U.S. Germany does have an "eVisa" system, but - again - they don't seem to be able embrace the concept and mandate a consulate/embassy visit for first time applications where other countries dispense with this step and capture biometrics on entry.
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