Cross-border commuters in the Berlin area 1948–1961
The cross-border commuter problem in the Berlin area arose at the beginning of the division of Berlin in 1948/49. It resulted from the affiliations of the city halves to different currency areas on the one hand and the historically grown unequal distribution of residential and industrial areas within the city and in the surrounding area with corresponding commuter flows on the other. In its propaganda, the SED ruling in East Berlin denied the general Berlin character of the cross-border commuter problem and used its one-sided presentation to justify the Berlin Wall in August 1961.
Emergence
After the introduction of the DM of the Bank Deutscher Lander (DM-West) in the western sectors of Berlin and the DM of the German Central Bank (DM-East) in the Soviet occupation zone and in the Soviet sector of Berlin, a cross-border commuter problem arose in the Berlin area in the summer of 1948. Around 122,000 West Berliners were employed in East Berlin or in the Berlin area and were paid with DM East there (East border commuters), while 76,000 East Berliners worked in the West Sectors of Berlin, where they, in the first few months according to a general Cap limit , were paid in DM West (West border commuters). As a result of the exchange rate of soon 1: 4, which corresponded to the roughly four times higher purchasing power of the DM-West compared to the DM-East, the existence of over 120,000 West Berlin households was endangered in the future with approximately the same wage rates in East and West.
Regulation by the western wage equalization fund
In order to be able to maintain the unified Berlin labor market, on March 20, 1949, together with the discontinuation of the cap, the Western powers created a wage compensation fund for employees in the commercial sector. There, the east cross-border commuters were able to exchange 60% of their DM-East wages at a rate of 1: 1 for DM-West, while the west-frontier commuters only got 10% of their income in DM-West and 90% in DM-East.
Because the east border commuters could not be included in the political and socio-political program of the SED, they reduced their number in a few years through mass layoffs and the closure of the West Berlin border (1952) to 13,000. The problem of cross-border commuters who were employed in authorities, police officers or teachers was already solved in 1948/49 when Berlin was split up . They were only allowed to keep their jobs if they relocated to the Eastern Sector. In any case, they were not recorded by the wage equalization fund.
In contrast, the SED failed to reduce the number of cross-border commuters from the West. Apart from a break-in around 1954, it was always around 40-60,000 until the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961. The pressure on these cross-border commuters from disadvantages in the allocation of housing, in the educational opportunities for children, the issuing of travel permits and an arbitrary interpretation of the foreign exchange regulations up to the imposition of imprisonment did not lead to the abandonment of their jobs in West Berlin, but in over 50,000 cases to fleeing to the west . Nevertheless, the number of cross-border commuters to the west did not decrease significantly. Because of the reduction in the number of cross-border commuters from the east, the wage equalization fund was able to constantly increase the west money quota for wage exchange. In August 1961 it was 40%, with a maximum of 275 DM. Taking up an employment relationship in West Berlin was attractive given the access to the higher quality range of goods in West Berlin and the favorable exchange rate despite the legal uncertainty.
In addition to the cross-border commuters registered in the East and West Berlin labor market, there were West cross-border commuters who worked as illegal workers, particularly in the cleaning, transport and catering trades. Their employment was illegal, took place irregularly and by the hour and, with 8,000 to a maximum of 20,000 participants, often pensioners , was of little economic importance.
The solution to the problem by the SED
When the escape from the republic in 1961 became increasingly extensive and the SED headed for a solution to the problem by cordoning off the western sectors of Berlin, it unleashed a cauldron against cross-border commuters for propaganda reasons, which they in the form of public events and a press campaign as traitors, criminals and put out parasites. A series of new regulations that came into force on August 1, 1961, made it practically impossible for cross-border commuters to continue their employment in West Berlin.
Before these regulations could take effect, however, the SED eliminated the cross-border commuter problem in the Berlin area by erecting the Berlin Wall on August 13, 1961. At that time, 12,000 cross-border commuters were still employed in East Berlin, including 6,000 with the Reichsbahn . Most of the others were active as artists (70% of the soloist staff at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden were West Berliners) or as scientists, technicians or doctors. The wage equalization fund had to stop its payments to the east cross-border commuters due to the lack of wage payments by western cross-border commuters. The latter were faced with the alternative of giving up their jobs or moving to the East. Only a few members of this staff, which was difficult to find for the GDR, decided to move and their jobs remained unfilled. The SED accepted this disadvantage in favor of the general cordoning off of the GDR.
The now unemployed former cross-border commuters from the West were exposed to discrimination in everyday life for a long time , were used in job creation below their qualifications and were under police surveillance.
Frontier workers
- Richard Baier (* 1926), RIAS reporter.
- Horst Buchholz (1933–2003), actor.
- Bruno Doehring (1879–1961), cathedral preacher and professor at Humboldt University.
- Walter Felsenstein (1901–1975), director of the Komische Oper.
- Anneliese Groscurth (1910–1996), political activist and doctor
- Hans Heinrich (1911–2003), film and television director
- Horst Kutscher (1931–1963), killed on the Berlin Wall.
- Günter Litfin (1937–1961), killed on the Berlin Wall.
- Rudolf Müller (* 1931), escape helper at the Berlin Wall.
- Liselotte Richter (1906–1968), professor at Humboldt University
- Kurt Scharf (1902–1990), Chairman of the Council of the Evangelical Church of the Union (EKU).
- Wolfgang Staudte (1906–1984), film director.
- Ingeborg Weber-Kellermann (1918–1993), deputy director at the Institute for German Folklore of the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin (DAW).
literature
- Frank Roggenbuch: The Berlin border commuter problem. Intertwining and system competition before the wall was built. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, New York 2008, ISBN 3-11-020344-8 (Publications of the Historical Commission in Berlin Volume 107).
- Erika M. Hoerning: Between the fronts. Berlin cross-border commuters and traders 1948–1961. Böhlau, Cologne, Weimar, Vienna 1992, ISBN 3-412-08091-8 .
- Frank Roggenbuch: Interdependence and System Competition. A consideration of the Berlin cross-border commuter problem. ( PDF file ).