The Trialog on July 03, 2017 was the second event in the series "German Sonderweg? - An Assessment of the Current Situation of Economic Policy and Economic Sciences in Germany". The positive growth in Germany compared to the rest of Europe and the favorable development on the labor market seem to confirm those voices that see a restrictive fiscal policy as no problem or even a prerequisite for a good economic development. At the same time, many national and international players diagnose Germany with an investment backlog despite a low-interest environment, which also leads to a shrinking of the public capital stock. For a long time now, foreign economists and international institutions have been questioning the "black zero" policy and the German debt brake; more recently, there has also been a debate at home about whether this policy makes sense.

The trialogue aimed to uncover the underlying explanatory patterns of these policies and to identify possible contradictions between economic paradigms.

The documentation prepares the different perspectives that were mentioned and discussed by the participants in the trialogue.