Very good summary of German economic thinking - the goal of combining a free market with a fair amount of redistribution has broad support. The German constitution defines Germany as a "Sozialstaat", which is not quite the same as what we call "welfare state" in the US but seeks to create social justice.<p>What's not mentioned is the remarkable fact that Germany was able to absorb the collapse of economically completely dysfunctional East Germany. If anything, the influx of a generation of Germans raised under "socialism" has strengthened the base of voters valuing economic stability. Despite western grumblings and the still existing Wessi/Ossi divide the reunification and subsequent wealth transfer from West to East was largely viewed as something that just had to be done.<p>It's hard to measure the performance of Germany over other large economies in isolation of the current state of the European Union, though. I think the opinion about Germany is quite different in other European nations, especially Greece. There you would find a large number of people claiming the performance of Germany's economy is at the expense of the smaller countries of the union.