Merz's next big reform. But where are the reforms?

Friedrich Merz finally has his reform moment. The trouble is that many of the 34 measures announced this week aren't really reforms at all.

Dear Reader,

Has Friedrich Merz finally found his mojo?

After 13 months of grand promises but little delivery; after a now-infamous retreat with his coalition partners at a Berlin villa that was supposed to produce a breakthrough but descended into rancour; after polls so disastrous that they sparked rumours of an inner-party coup… at last, the chancellor seems to have found his stride.

Last week, he was able to announce a planned pension reform that will raise the age of retirement and start investing a slice of workers’ salaries on the stock market. His coalition partners in the SPD, long resistant to changes that would hit their blue-collar base, had to nod along to plans to abolish early retirement for manual workers.

This week, the chancellor had another trick up his sleeve. He called the capital’s media to a surprise press conference just hours after meeting coalition bigwigs to find a final compromise on his big reform agenda.

The coalition committee (Koalitionsausschuss) is a term…