Trying to help somebody enter my country who requires an official permission to do so, a visa, has opened my eyes to what seems to be a strange imbalance. When I applied for my student visa to China in 2007 I needed my passport, a passport-sized photograph, a filled in application form, a letter of acceptance from my school and some €25 - 30. Now in reverse, to say for a Chinese citizen to apply for a European Schengen visa is a major pain is a major understatement (so let this be my apology to any Chinese citizens reading this). To apply for a similar student visa they need also proof of their livelihood: half a year as a student requires a balance of at least €7660 - the mind boggles at the number - or an official letter of invitation from a person or organisation in Germany that will provide for their livelihood. They need a letter from the school they enrolled at showing that they have paid their tuition fees in full (this may well not be a trivial amount either). They require evidence that they have bought German health insurance covering at least €30,000 plus repatriation. They require a complete curriculum vitae. Finally, the applicant must write a detailed explanation why he or she would like to study in Germany. It goes without saying that you need to bring various copies of all this. You then have to attend a formal interview with someone from the embassy where you will probably be further quizzed as to your motives and plans and whatnot.
Now I understand Germany wants to protect itself from "economic refugees". Those would be foreigners, mostly from poor, developing countries, who see Germany is wealthy, offers lots of social benefits and thus try very hard to sneak into the country and somehow become part of this system (preferably without putting in too much).
On the other hand, Germany has granted asylum to hundreds of thousands of foreigners, most of who have no means to support themselves, many even arrive with hardly any belongings at all. Furthermore, Germany is also inviting Russians of German descent to return to Germany, regardless of how long their family has lived in Russia. The German government provides for these people including food and housing. There have even been complaints that some asylum seeker housing was not as good as the average home of local people.
Now this is a difficult situation. We don't want to appear unkind. There are also still many Germans around who know what it is like to be a refugee because of war or persecution. We don't want to see other people in the world suffer. And since we are better off than many it is only right to offer aid and succor to those who need it. However, a number of these asylum seekers are just that kind of economic refugees that we are trying so hard to keep out. I really wonder just how many of them are these days. Moreover, many then proceed to bring over large families from their homes that also need support.
I want there to be no misunderstanding. I have no problem living in a multi-cultural nation. Most of my friends are not German. I would like to be able to say that visitors and permanent residents from other countries have enriched Germany with more than just cheap Chinese and Turkish take-aways. And I would welcome more cultural interchange.
However, why is it so complicated for a Chinese to come to Germany and visit a language school (or even just come for a holiday) whereas asylum seekers don't seem to be given much of a second thought. The fundamental difference is, of course, that the Chinese student comes to Germany to spend money whereas the average asylum seeker comes needing money. Again, I want to stress that I don't mean we should close our borders to people in need. There needs to be a reasonable limit to how much aid Germany can and will offer. We may look like a wealthy country to people in the developing world and the exchange rate makes us even more so. What many don't know is that Germany is itself struggling with some deep-seated financial problems like its health-care system or its old-age pensions (just to name a few). The government recently vowed to spend billions of Euros to help Greece and that was money they technically did not have. My point is that if the government continues to give away stuff (this also includes benefits and subsidies to Germans but that's yet another story) it will be us who will end up poor. And this will mean that we will have nothing left to give either.
I believe it is high time for a change of direction: to encourage people to come to Germany not to receive money but to spend it. I have spoken to some Chinese people who opted to go to Switzerland or Czeck Republic or other European countries simply because the German visa application is so complicated. Thus, entire groups of Chinese tourists or students wealthy enough to afford flight tickets, hotels or even tuition choose to spend their money somewhere else. Continuing to liberally admit asylum seekers may give us the moral higher ground to countries which choose not to but moral is not something a country can continue to exist on. Just as an example, the UK attracts thousands of foreigners every year by making education one of their major exports. I used to be one of them. Non-EU students sometimes pay in excess of £10,000 for a single year of higher education. A stupefying sum which does not even include living or housing, which then costs you a further arm and a leg. Teaching may only be average, the living standard may be low compared to other European countries but still they keep coming. They somehow manage to present little UK as the promised land. I think Germany really needs to rethink its marketing strategy.