To this day, I don't understand why digitalization of government operations is a political topic to the degree it is in Germany. I mean, I would expect it to be an internal process, something the bureaucracy would handle. But instead, it's a significant campaign issue, something that German politicians talk about and have political programs designed around.

It wasn't a political topic like this in the US. I haven't seen British media doing it. Maybe some other countries have digitalization as a political issue and just don't mention it in English-language media, so I'm unaware of it there, and it's just shown up in English-language German media.

And while I get wanting to be a tech leader in this area or that, I'm skeptical that digitalization of government processes is a major driver of that. Yet it seems to get lugged up every time someone is talking about high tech industry in Germany.

I'll believe that there are savings to be had, and those might benefit German industry, in the broad sense that reducing government costs is helpful. But I don't think that digitalizing government is a huge enabler for German domestic high-tech industry.