Modern readers, even casual students of 20th Century history, often fail to realize the remarkably high standard of living enjoyed by the average German in the early 1950s.
After the end of the Allied bombing offensive in 1947, Inner Germany rapidly recovered from the remarkably wide-spread damage that RAF Lancasters and USAAF B-17 & 29s had visited on Germany. Fully half the conscripted labor provided by the Molotov government in 1948-52 was employed (in 20 hour days) on the reconstruction of German cities and infrastructure with the result being fully rebuilt cities rising Phoenix-like from the ashes of the Allied 1940-47 bombings. German citizens who did not fall befoul of the Gestapo, which to most Germans had become more of a Boogeyman than actual threat as dissent (and dissenters) disappeared from daily life, enjoyed full employment, seven weeks of paid vacation (ten weeks in the case of Party members) subsidized by the Reich Government, and free medical and dental care. The Reichmark was the most powerful currency on the Continent, allowing German travelers incredible purchasing power on their regular trips to France, Italy and the rest of Occupied Europe, and the Mark’s strength continued into the neutral states of Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland where luxury items, including some products from the West unavailable within Occupied Europe, could be secured for the trip home. Through these shopping adventures the average Reich citizen was able to keep themselves well supplied with otherwise embargoed consumer goods ranging from exotic spices from the East and other foodstuffs including oranges from Florida and avocados from California to inexpensive appliances, with the Mark’s buying power allowing the average housefrau in Berlin to enjoy luxuries virtually unknown outside to any other in Europe except the ruling elite. Even the average American family did not enjoy the leisure time, easy work life, and buying power that were common across Inner Germany.
The Reich citizen was constantly reminded of how good their life was by the Party controlled media. Be it radio, films, or the new television, the media showed constant reminders of the innate superiority of the Aryan Race to all other. Cleverly written “news” programs and films showed the seething unrest rampant across the U.S., massive food riots in England and open civil war cross India. None of these were true, but with no independent source of information the Reich citizens did not know this. What they did know was that the Americans were gangsters, the British brutal colonizers, and that the Allied armies were gathered from the scum of the Earth. No Reich citizen doubted, even for a moment, that barbarism would descend on the entire world if the shining list of National Socialism was extinguished.