Talk:Inequality in Germany

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Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:58, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Untitled

Roger, This is a good start. You might look at this article as a model for Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_inequality_in_the_United_States

Also, I would use sources found in peer-reviewed journal articles or books rather than the World Socialist Website. The paragraphs are very rough drafts and need significant copy editing. Words are missing and there are number of punctuation issues. This is something that's going to be read by anyone. Here are a few more sources: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1475-4991.1996.tb00142.x/abstract http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1094202509000532 http://inequalitywatch.eu/spip.php?article114&lang=fr http://www.voxeu.org/epubs/cepr-reports/german-income-inequality Mcassell04 (talk) 10:54, 13 October 2015 (UTC)

Substantively, I think this is good. However, the structure to the writing is a little awkward at times and needs revision. It did not feel like a Wikipedia article structurally. All things considered, I think the number of sources you've cited already is a good indicator of material on the topic. AustinMcCrea (talk) 03:24, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Looking at previous comments, I would like to agree with what has already been said. Some of the sentence structure is a little awkward to read at times. However, I do like the way the material is presented. You follow all of the Wikipedia guidelines and have a great start to the article! I would also say, do not be afraid to hyperlink different subjects. If you look at the suggested Income Inequality in the United States as mentioned previously, they have a lot of words hyperlinked, so even if you think it may be excessive, do not be afraid to continue to do so! Finally, as mentioned before, I would look for more peer reviewed articles. I think what you have is a great start for information and structure, and now you need to go a little more in depth with deeper information.Kyle McClain Kent (talk) 17:22, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

This is a great start to an article and the Wikipedia guidelines appear to be followed, good job! I would suggest adding a subsection titled "household inequality". I also would suggest changing "income and wealth" and making it "economic inequality". I think you may be able to have a wider spectrum of analysis by doing so. I think it may also be useful to have information that explains Germany's role in global inequality or at least it in comparison to other countries.--Jfords25 (talk) 06:09, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Rewrite 2016-05-03

I rewrote the article to follow a more encylopaedic style of writing. I also found that in general, the writing was quite biased, with certain sentences taking their sources out of context, or drawing conclusions from sources not made by those sources. I also felt that social inequality deserved a separate section. That said, the social inequality section still needs rewriting; racism by small extremist groups is not really social inequality, which is more about income divides, divides in general living conditions, etc. stratified by ethnicity. It is worth noting that Wikipedia articles should not attempt to draw their own conclusions from sources, instead presenting the information in a way that allows the reader to do that themselves, regardless of which conclusion they may come to. Kookas (talk) 22:51, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Factual errors and limited scope: income vs wealth Gini, misattributed source, outdated sourcing, missing dimensions

The article had several substantive problems, most of them checkable against the cited sources themselves, and its scope was narrower than the topic warrants. I've rewritten and expanded it per WP:SOFIXIT, and I'm listing the specifics here for transparency and per WP:BRD in case anyone wants to discuss.

• Income and wealth Gini coefficients were conflated. The lead reported an income Gini, then the body gave "0.78 in 2012" next to France 0.68, Italy 0.61 and Slovakia 0.45. Those are wealth Ginis, from the DIW/SOEP study reported by the very Reuters source cited (its headline is about wealth distribution being the most unequal in the euro zone). Germany's income Gini is about 0.30 (Eurostat, Destatis). Presenting a 0.78 wealth figure under an income heading tells the reader Germany is among the most income-unequal countries on earth, which is false. Fails WP:V.
• The opening source was misattributed. "According to data from the World Bank, Germany has the 14th lowest Gini coefficient regarding income in the world" was cited to ref [1], which is OECD income-inequality data, not the World Bank. The OECD set covers member states only, so "in the world" claimed more than the source supports. The one genuine World Bank citation was ref [4], attached to the reunification paragraph, a different claim entirely. WP:V, WP:CITE.
• The reunification passage was inaccurate. "funded and governed by a communist Russian regime" was wrong twice over: the GDR was governed by the SED and aligned with the Soviet Union, not Russia, and it was not "funded" by it (Soviet reparations ran the other way in the early postwar years). The east–west gap also owes far more to the reunification shock, the 1:1 currency union and Treuhandanstalt privatisation, than to a "manufacturing technology gap." WP:V.
• The gender claim was contradicted by current data. The lead said gender inequality had been "rising" since the mid-1990s, a clause already tagged "citation needed". The unadjusted gender pay gap has been falling: 18% in 2023 to 16% in 2024 per Destatis, the largest drop since 2006. The 23% figure in the body was from 2008, was unadjusted, and was never distinguished from the adjusted gap of about 6%. WP:V, WP:AGEMATTERS.
• Stale figures throughout. Income and wealth figures dated to 2008–2012, and the dollar conversion implied a 2012–14 exchange rate. Replaced with 2023–2025 data from Destatis, the Bundesbank (Panel on Household Finances 2023) and Eurostat. WP:AGEMATTERS.
• Unreliable source. Two claims traced to the World Socialist Web Site (wsws.org), which is not a reliable source for economic statistics. Replaced with Destatis, Bundesbank, DIW and Eurostat. WP:RS, WP:NPOV.
• Internal inconsistencies. The lead dated the rise of inequality to "the mid-1990s"; the next section said "since the 1980s." The "23.2%" and "23.1%" gender figures were the same statistic quoted twice at different precision.
• Scope was too narrow. The previous version covered only income, wealth and gender, plus a thin and partly inaccurate reunification passage, and omitted dimensions central to the subject. I've added sourced sections on the history of inequality (the Bismarckian origins of the welfare state, the twentieth-century wealth compressions documented by Albers, Bartels and Schularick, and the rise since around 2000), inequality by migration background (Destatis poverty data), ethnic and racial discrimination (labour-market correspondence studies and the 2020 Afrozensus), and social mobility and education (OECD mobility estimates and the DZHW "educational funnel").

I've kept the rewrite to what the sources state and added no analysis of my own (WP:NOR); the Afrozensus is attributed as a self-selected community survey rather than treated as population statistics. I've aimed throughout for a neutral register (WP:NPOV). Glad to talk through anything that looks wrong. Konstantin Wandel (talk) 12:49, 21 June 2026 (UTC)