No wonder, then, that Angela Merkel plumped for Frankfurt when she looked for a prosperous, satisfied backdrop in her campaign for a third term as Chancellor. Here Merkel pounded out a message that good times were here again and voters should be cautioned against change.
With her steady hand on the tiller, she said, Germany had sailed through turbulence and returned to robust growth and jobs a-plenty.
"Germany was once the sick man of Europe, but we reformed. In 2005, there were five million unemployed. Today it is less than three million," she told the crowd. Several dozen leftwing protesters demonstrated raucously, waving posters denouncing US spying on German citizens and clamouring for Merkel to go. With whistles and noisemakers, they made such a din that children covered their ears and some elderly left for home early.
No matter, though. Many thousands turned up for "Angie," some of them brandishing the colours of Merkel's Christian Democrats or donning orange-and-white pork-pie hats dished out by her well-heeled party. Merkel's campaign slogan is "Put Germany's future in good hands," and uses the diamond shape that she frequently makes when she puts her hands together. "We've had four good years, I have referred to that, but it is not a given that the next four years will also be good," warns Merkel.
Compared to the racier standards of elections in other countries, the battle for the Bundestag, Germany's Lower House of Parliament, is snoresville. But this, after nearly a century of imperialism, Nazism and communism, is what Germans like. And Merkel exploits their craving for low-key politics with a virtuoso talent, as cleverly as Margaret Thatcher played the role of grocer's daughter to woo Middle England in the 1980s. The Chancellor's image seems almost purposely designed to be as stolid - and about as sexy - as sausages and dumplings.
She has a stout figure and a short, no-nonsense haircut, dresses like a frumpy 54-year-old school teacher and rarely raises her voice. She and her husband like to go on simple walking holidays each year in Austria. She has even been spotted at supermarket checkouts. Angela Merkel was born to be mild.
A much-touted television debate between Merkel and Peer Steinbrueck, head of the Opposition Social Democratic Party, saw her steer the tone to one of politeness and willingness to explore issues rather than the trading of insults and sound bites.
Merkel's steady performance consolidated the months-long predictions of opinion polls, most of which say she will renew the governing alliance of conservatives and pro-business Free Democrats.
However, other coalition permutations with her still at the helm are also possible and a large number of don't-knows or conservatives who may not vote on polling day could cause an upset. "There's a lot of volatility and the pool of swing voters is larger than ever before," Wolfgang Gibowski, an electoral researcher at the University of Potsdam, told foreign journalists.
If Merkel makes it over the line, it will be due more than anything to an economic wind that has been blowing firmly in her favour for the last three years. In the crisis year of 2008, gross domestic product contracted by 5.1 per cent; two years later, it bounced back, expanding by 4.1 per cent, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Growth last year was 0.7 per cent; for 2013, it is expected to be 0.4 per cent, rising to almost 2 per cent in 2014.
Unemployment affects just 5.0 per cent of the workforce, compared to a whopping 10.7 per cent in neighbouring France. A shortage of skilled workers in an economy dominated by manufactured exports has become a major worry for employers.
Merkel's Achilles' heel has been grumbling by the electorate at the cost of bailing out Greece, for which Germany is doing the heavy lifting. A survey carried out by insurers R+V Versicherun, and released last week showed that 68 per cent of Germans still consider the European debt crisis the country's greatest concern.
Here again, Merkel has so far cannily killed any controversy. The euro crisis initially played "practically no role in the campaign," said Lueder Gerken, of the Centre for European Policy. "Only in the last two weeks have people started to question the claim that the Euro crisis is more or less over."
In the name of European solidarity, the SDP have backed the support package - and thus indirectly endorsed the Chancellor's argument that, far from being soft, she was tough and forced the Greeks into cutting waste and corruption..
