Germany to Fire Starting Gun on Early Elections

Welcome to the Brussels Edition, Bloomberg’s daily briefing on what matters most in the heart of the European Union.

Today marks Germany’s turn to trigger an early election as Chancellor Olaf Scholz uses a constitutional quirk to force a national ballot on Feb. 23. If opinion polls are to be trusted, the outcome should be less messy than in France, where there is still no workable government six months after President Emmanuel Macron called a snap vote. Germany is used to governing by coalition, though the ascent of the far right presents a similar challenge to France. The conservative Christian Democratic-led bloc is ahead in the polls with 31%, the far-right Alternative for Germany at 18%; Scholz’s Social Democrats have 17%, the Greens 13.4%. Scholz, who has led a fractured three-way coalition since late 2021, has failed to kick start an economy that may be facing a point of no return. It’s now 5% smaller than it would have been had pre-pandemic growth rates been maintained — and on a path of decline that threatens to become irreversible.