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Berlin and Munich
Two major cities in Germany, about a 70 minute flight apart, or a five hour train ride apart,
or a six hour car ride apart.
Both highly influential, both cosmopolitan, both highly desired places to live and work
due to an overall high standard of living.
In fact, my friend Willie from the channel KhAnubis actually moved from the United States
to Berlin, and he loves it there.
He loves it there so much he actually also just released a video all about Berlin over
on his channel.
Check it out when you’re done here, if you shall dare.
But hey Munich often is at the top of “most livable cities in the world” lists.
So let’s compare these two rivals, starting with their similarities.
First of all, the population of the metropolitan areas of both is about the same.
(B- 6.1 million, M- 6 million) However, in each city proper, Berlin has a lot more residents
than Munich.
(B-3.8 million, M- 1.5 million) Berlin also is MUCH bigger in actual area.
It’s more spread out, yo.
Both are capitals!
Ok, well Munich is just the capital of the German federal state of Bavaria, while Berlin
is capital of ALL OF GERMANY.
Oh, and it’s literally its own German federal state.
Both have some of the most prestigious universities on the planet and finest museums.
Berlin has over 100.
Both have an oceanic climate, and get about the same amount of sunshine on average.
However, Munich gets much more precipitation.
(B- 515.2 mm, M- 944 mm) Berlin gets a bit colder in the winter, while Munich gets a
bit warmer in the summer.
Public transportation is amazing in both cities, but is better in Berlin and yeah more expensive there, too.
You’ll see lots of cyclists in both, as both have highly developed bike lane systems.
Because both are in Germany, it’s quite legal and quite common to see folks out and
about drinking alcohol.
Both have a stock exchange.
Residents of both are not that religious.
In fact, around half of all Munich residents and 60% of all Berlin residents have no registered
religious affiliation.
Both have hosted the Summer Olympics.
Berlin, in 1936, and Munich, in 1972.
That Olympics is sadly known for the Munich massacre, in which terrorists killed members
of the Israeli Olympic team.
The Berlin Olympics is sadly known as the one in which Hitler was in power and he was
trying to promote racism and antisemitism at the games.
Both have giant towers.
Berlin has the iconic Berlin Television Tower, which is the tallest structure in Germany
and often a symbol for the entire country.
Munich has the Olympic Tower, but the Berlin Television Tower is taller and definitely
more famous ok?
Being in Germany, residents of both get universal healthcare.
Both are culturally diverse.
21% of Berlin residents were born in another country, while 37% of Munich residents were
born in another country.
I’d argue Berlin and Munich have more differences than similarities.
First of all, Munich has been around longer, well probably.
It all started in the Holy Roman Empire...
In 1157, Henry the Lion, the duke of Bavaria said monks could build a market where the
road from Salzburg met the Isar River.
And thus, Munich was born.
German merchants founded Berlin in the early 1200s, although some settlers were there before that.
Berlin isn’t mentioned in writing until 1251, though.
In 1255, Bavarian nobles known as the Wittelsbach family came to Munich, and for the next 700
years heavily influenced the town.
One of the Wittelsbach family members was a king turned Holy Roman Emperor named Louis
the Bavarian.
He greatly expanded the size of Munich and gave it a monopoly on producing and selling salt.
Much of Munich was destroyed by two different fires- one in 1327 and another in 1429, but
both times the residents rebuilt.
Meanwhile, by the 1400s the Hohenzollern family had now ruled over Berlin.
Just like the Wittelsbachs in Munich, the Hohenzollerns would heavily influence Berlin
for hundreds of years.
In 1417, Berlin became the capital of the Margraviate of Brandenburg, a principality
of the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1432, Berlin and the town of Cölln merged.
Over the next 200 years, both Berlin-Cölln and Munich steadily grew in population and
wealth, with occasional setbacks like when the bubonic plague came to town.
In 1506, Munich became capital of all of Bavaria.
Both cities couldn’t escape the turmoil surrounding the Protestant Reformation.
Berlin ended up in the Lutheran camp, whereas Munich remained a Roman Catholic stronghold.
The Thirty Years War hurt both towns.
Berlin lay in financial ruins afterwards and had its population reduced from 12,000 down
to 7500.
An epidemic during that war caused Munich to lose 1/3 of its population.
In the 1700s, Berlin was now just Berlin, and now capital of the Kingdom of Prussia,
which was quickly becoming quite a big deal in Europe.
Meanwhile, the Habsburg family controlled Munich.
Louis I, the king of Bavaria from 1825 to 1848, had a big influence on Munich.
His architects basically created the appearance of Munich we know and love today.
The 1800s saw both Berlin and Munich becoming major cities in Europe, and both attracted
lots of immigrants trying to make some money, as well as some of the greatest thinkers in history.
And then folks in Berlin were like, let’s unite all the German princedoms into a modern state.
They even convinced most of Bavaria to join.
By 1871, both cities were in the newly created German Empire.
And massive industry helped both cities continue to grow.
By 1900, Munich had around half a million people, and Berlin had around 1.9 million people.
When Germany entered what would become World War One, spirits were high in both cities,
but that ended as the war dragged on.
France bombed Munich three times, and the Allied blockade led to food and fuel shortages
in both.
After the devastating war was over, things didn’t get any better in Germany.
Berlin remained the capital of what was now the Weimar Republic, which was constantly
under threat by radicals from both the left and right ends of the political spectrum.
The economic situation was horrible in those post-war years.
Due to hyperinflation, many in both Berlin and Munich lost all wealth they previously had.
In response to all these troubles, a new political group emerged promising to make Germany great again.
Yep, the Nazi Party, who had a big presence in Munich.
On November 8-9, 1923, the Nazis tried to overthrow the German government there in what
became known as the Beer Hall Putsch.
Those who conspired were arrested and charged with treason.
One of those arrested was Adolf Hitler, who later became the leader of the Nazi Party
and got elected to power in 1932.
The year after, Hitler was the dictator of Germany.
During Hitler’s reign of terror, Berlin and Munich were both Nazi strongholds.
The Nazis opened the first concentration camp just northwest of Munich.
Like many German cities at the time, both were simply devastated since the Allied Powers
bombed the heck out of them during World War Two.
Day after day of bombing after bombing after bombing.
At the end of the war, the good news was that Hitler was dead, but the bad news was both
cities were unrecognizable.
The Allied Powers destroyed around 50% of Munich and 90% of Berlin.
This is why Berlin looks so modern today- most of its older buildings didn’t survive
the war, while Munich still has plenty of older buildings.
Anyway, both were occupied by the Allied Powers, you know since ALL of Germany was.
The Soviet Union controlled East Germany and East Berlin, and Britain, France, and the
United States controlled West Germany and West Berlin, which was completely within East Germany.
Now I’d argue that Munich was lucky, since it was part of West Germany and quickly came
back stronger than ever.
Berlin continued to be a tense place.
Joseph Stalin, the dictator of the Soviet Union, started a blockade to Berlin so that
the U.S., Britain, and France couldn’t get supplies and food to their peoples there.
Well, the U.S. and Britain broke that blockade by smuggling in food and supplies anyway.
This was known as the Berlin Airlift, and really escalated the Cold War.
During the Cold War, the democratic, capitalist-leaning West Berlin and Munich did much better economically
than the Communist East Berlin.
Look, this is why so many East Berliners fled to West Berlin, to a point where the East
German government put up a wall between the two on August 13, 1961, and made it so you
had to go through checkpoints to travel back and forth.
That wall stood for 28 years, and during that time around 80 people were killed trying to
illegally cross from East to West Berlin.
But yeah, after that wall was torn down and Germany and Berlin reunited and communism
fell, for the most part Berlin has been booming ever since.
A reunited Germany once again made Berlin the capital.
Then again, Munich had a big head start economically.
Today, while Berlin has a higher GDP, Munich has a better overall economy (B- €36,798
GDP per capita, M- €75,186 GDP per capita).
Its unemployment rate is lower.
(B- 8%, M- 5.4%)
Berlin also has a higher crime rate overall, and yes also has a higher poverty rate.
(B- 18.2%, M- 12%)
Sure, German is the language most spoken in both, (hey that makes sense) but residents
in Berlin speak a different dialect of German than residents of Munich.
The dialect you often hear in Munich, Bavarian, is actually quite a bit different than standard German.
Oh, if Munich residents want to speak standard German they can, still with a Bavarian accent,
of course.
The largest religious group other than the “nones” is EKD Protestants in Berlin and
Roman Catholics in Munich.
Berlin has slightly worse traffic.
Munich is growing at a faster rate.
Berlin has a much lower cost of living.
That said, the cost of living there has been sharply on the rise in recent years.
Also, the average annual salary is higher in Munich.
(B-€49,000, M-€50,400)
Major industries in Munich include technology, electronics, automobile manufacturing, and media.
In fact, Munich is the biggest publishing city in all of Europe.
Major industries in Berlin include retail, information and communication technology,
biotechnology, and transportation.
Oh you don’t want to work?
You just want to play?
Well fine.
Major attractions in Berlin include The Brandenburg Gate, Museum Island, (I'm going to butcher the pronunciation on this, but)Gendarmenmarkt, and the
Berlin Wall Memorial.
Major attractions in Munich include Marienplatz and the New Town Hall, the English Garden,
Munich Residenz, and Nymphenburg Palace.
Berlin also has Europe’s most visited zoo.
Munich has mountains nearby, Berlin does not.
Yep, those are the Alps.
Munich is on the foothills of that dramatic mountain range that cuts across Europe.
Berlin is mostly flat, in an area of marshy woodlands.
Munich is more landlocked, right in the middle of the continent, while Berlin is just over
200km from the Baltic Sea.
Berlin has two international airports, Munich just one.
Berlin is known for its distinct neighborhoods commonly referred to as Kiez, many formed
around the remnants of neighborhoods not destroyed during World War Two.
Berlin has distinct shops, which are basically convenience stores known for being open either
very late or 24 hours a day called spätis.
Spätis are not really much of a thing in Munich.
Most say Berlin has a better nightlife, but Munich is famous for Oktoberfest, the world’s
largest beer festival, which happens annually from late September to the first Sunday in October.
Well, not this year obviously due to this dang pandemic.
Oktoberfest features lots of, you know, drinking beer, but also lots of amusement rides, games,
great food, and other fun stuff.
It’s a proud Bavarian tradition going back to 1810.
While perhaps it's obvious that football, or soccer, is huge in both cities, Munich
has Bayern Munich, the most successful club in German football history.
They’ve won 30 national titles and 20 national cups, for crying out loud.
Berlin has a lot more graffiti.
I mean, Berlin is world famous for its street art, and is just known as a magnet for creative people.
And yeah, Munich does seem cleaner and more low-key.
Berlin has the Stolpersteine, or stumbling stones on sidewalks all over the city that
honor folks persecuted by the Nazis between 1933 and 1945.
I guess I need to wrap this up.
Ok, so culturally, Munich and Berlin do seem different in many ways.
Munich still has a bit of a snobby vibe, and Berlin still has quite the hipster vibe, but
one thing is for sure- both cities are no doubt, two of the most desired places to live
on the entire planet.
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Thanks to Newsvoice for sponsoring this video.
A reminder to check out Willie’s video about Berlin over on his channel KhAnubis.
Since he has lived in Berlin, I definitely had him look over this script, so thank you Willie for doing that.
I don't know anyone from Munich, so if you ARE actually from Munich, I want to hear from you. who lived in Munich, so if you’re from Munich,
I wanna hear from ya. Let me know in the comments below.
What did I get wrong, what did I get right?
(pause) Wait a second, did I get anything right?
What am I doing with my life?