It looks like the polls might have been right. Earlier this week, prior to Germany's much touted "job summit," called to address appallingly high unemployment numbers, both German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and opposition leader Angela Merkel had promised they would work together in a spirit of bipartisanship to find a solution. It was, they said, their patriotic duty to put aside party politics and to find a way to send the 5.2 million unemployed Germans back to work. Surveys, though, had indicated that between 77 percent and 82 percent of Germans expected very little. The skeptics were right.

The packed day of politics started with a State-of-the-Union style speech by Schroeder in front of the German parliament followed by retorts from opposition head Angela Merkel and her powerful sidekick Edmund Stoiber. Yet while unemployment was the topic of the day, it was clear that party politicking was the overarching theme. Schroeder did make some concrete suggestions: He proposed sinking corporate taxes from the current level of 25 percent to 19 percent, promised new investments in "infrastructure," and announced steps that will make it easier to start new companies. He also, though, took refuge in rhetoric, demanding, for example, solidarity with those just starting their careers but unable to find jobs and with older workers in danger of losing their positions. He made no mention, however, of reducing payroll burdens to make it cheaper for companies to hire.

As soon as he stepped down from the podium, however, the opposition went on the attack. Merkel accused Schroeder of getting bogged down in details and not stepping back to look at the big picture saying he was "only a repairman and not an architect." Stoiber called Schroeder's speech a "disappointment." Both, however, seemed to be posturing more for each other's benefit -- the question as to which of them will represent the center-right for the Chancellory in next year's election has still not been definitively answered.

The joint meeting held immediately following the parliamentary dust-up offered a bit more in the way of concrete proposals and counter proposals, but in the end it was clear that the job summit had turned into more of a job molehill. The two sides agreed to the corporate tax cut -- which both had supported anyway -- and to reduce bureaucracy. And they agreed to study each other's proposals. Schroeder found the results "important." Merkel said the results were "partly worthwhile."

With the politicking out of the way, however, major German dailies on Friday offer up their verdicts of what happened on Thursday. They are not positive: Most commentators feel that, despite the hoopla, very little was accomplished in the end.

Leading the way in the negativity department on Friday was the Financial Times Deutschland, which saw the job summit less as a pact to reduce unemployment and more as the beginning of the campaign for the 2006 general elections. While the paper does mention that the reduction in corporate taxes may have some beneficial effect, "If any unemployed person actually hoped that the ... job summit would give him a new opportunity to find work, then he has to quickly rebury this hope." Why? Because the two sides were much more worried about their own political futures. "A cooperative 'Pact for Germany' doesn't look like this -- this is more like the final struggle for political power."

The center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung likewise saw the results of the summit as being far less than they should have been. Both sides, argues the paper, were desperate to to show something for their efforts -- neither, however, was really committed to the dramatic changes that are necessary. Schroeder came off as especially allergic to taking large steps, instead offering up a "bouquet of mini-measures." Instead of prioritizing any steps that would lead to more jobs -- as German President Horst Koehler had demanded earlier in the week -- the paper says that for Schroeder, "the right of way for jobs lasts only until the intersection with other interests.... Schroeder is relying on adjusting 20 different-sized screws. But that won't provide the motor of the economy ... with the new power it needs."

The financial daily Handelsblatt is pleased with the reduction of the corporate tax and the proposed elimination of the inheritance tax for companies passing from one family generation to the next. The paper says that such changes had not been imaginable even just three weeks ago when the opposition sent an open letter to the government demanding a solution to the jobless problem. Nevertheless, the paper warns, it remains to be seen how the tax cuts will be financed and the government's proposal on this question is far away from the opposition's idea -- a situation which could lead to a stalemate. And in any case, "this is not a complete solution to all tax problems. But still, it is a mini-breakthrough."

Not everyone is even willing to go that far. The reduction of the corporate tax will, the center-left Sueddeutsche Zeitung argues, do nothing to reduce unemployment. Reforms introduced in 2000 already provided substantial tax relief to Germany's larger companies -- the same firms that will be affected by the new proposal -- and, with all of the loopholes built into the law, they pay little corporate tax as it is. But, "they laid off thousands of workers anyway. Global companies are interested in more than just the tax burden. When markets shrink -- and Germany, with its halting domestic demand, is a shrinking market -- nobody wants to make large investments." The result of the announced reforms, the paper concludes, will be effectively zero.