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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 14th, 2023

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  • This is a good step, but from experiences of friends and family:

    The real problem with the immigration process here is that the Ausländerbehörden (the municipal departments dealing with immigration) are so incredibly understaffed which makes the immigration process hell for anyone applying without hiring a (for many too expensive) lawyer.

    My ex-gf qualified for citizenship but wanted this confirmed and it took months to get someone on the phone. She then had to send her ORIGINAL birth certificate in and they only confirmed that it had arrived 8 months after sending it (not an extreme case according to other friends) and if you call them to ask if it has arrived you get literally yelled at.

    My cousin also married an American and he reported the same, as well as multiple other friends: for whatever you want, it is many months of waiting time between every single appointment. For getting citizenship this sucks for many reasons, but it is even worse for all the people who can and want to work here, but will need years to get a work visa, even if you clearly qualify.

    I am 100% for making it easier to obtain citizenship, but passig laws like this without massively expanding processing capacity will only make the reality of obtaining citizenship even worse.



  • It’s important to remember that there’s kids working to earn some extra cash for themselves (what I did as a teen and it sounds like you did, too) and there’s kids from families that aren’t well off where they have to work to support their struggling families. It is exploitation of the latter that we should be worried and upset about. Most people are fine with kids working a couple hours a week, but they shouldn’t be forced (by the system) to work daily so they have a chance of getting enough food on the table.

    Oh, and btw, the working a couple hours a week thing is perfectly normal for kids in many European countries, too. I worked during holidays starting when I was 14 in Germany but IIRC only once you’re 16 you can actually do many hours