[tjansen]

> not so high that it's impossible to learn the trade in 6 months.

In Germany, with its apprenticeship system, it is. Typically it takes three years. In some trades you can work without the official license, but in many you are not allowed to. The whole apprenticeship system is so fundamental in Germany that I think it would be very difficult to get rid of it.

[ManuelKiessling]

And really, would we want that? I’m not saying that it’s a perfect system on every dimension, but it makes for insanely high quality work on average. And it’s easy to get used to it and take it as granted. Being married to a Hungarian wife and seeing the quality of work in the trades in Hungary first hand really made me appreciate the German system.

As stupid as “am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen” is in general – for the trades it might actually make sense.