More than 60 million German voters go to the polls tomorrow and Christian Democrat (CDU) leader Angela Merkel is already mentally measuring for curtains in the Berlin chancellery.
As a likely conservative takeover looms, German business leaders are sounding increasingly like the People's Front of Judea in Monty Python's Life of Brian.
"What has Schröder ever done for us?" they decry from the business pages.
Well, he shook up the business landscape and saved German companies billions by abolishing the 40-50 per cent tax on the sale of crossholdings in each other. He cut corporate taxes from 30-40 per cent to 25 per cent. He loosened hire/fire laws for small companies and strengthened the hand of managers to push through decentralised pay deals.
"But apart from all that," they ask, "what has Schröder ever done for us?"
"The Schröder government has brought Germany on a lot further than is perceived. For a centre-left government, it did an awful lot," said Thomas Straubhaar, head of the HWWA economic think-tank.
The government's achievements were even more impressive, he said, considering it inherited the economic hangover when the artificial post-unification boom went bust and the real costs of the mammoth project became evident.
"Germany is transferring 4 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) to the eastern states every year," he said. "Not many other countries could manage that and stay above water."
There was a time when Mr Schröder's pro-business policies earned him the ironic title "the bosses' comrade". This year the party rediscovered its left-wing roots when disillusioned Social Democrat (SPD) left-wingers broke away to form a new left-wing grouping.
SPD leader Franz Münterfering launched a bizarre attack on big business in April, comparing hedge funds and opportunistic investors to "swarms of locusts" which descend on German companies, pick them clean and move on.
That was the perfect opportunity for German business leaders to change horses and back the CDU as the cure-all to shake Germany out of its economic slump.
A survey of 500 top managers for Capital magazine showed that 68 per cent are hoping that the CDU's Angela Merkel will be the next chancellor, while just 27 per cent back Mr Schröder.
"A victory for the opposition Christian Democrats of Angela Merkel in the forthcoming general elections would be good news for German companies, while another term for Chancellor Schröder's Social Democrats could only spell gloom and doom," said Jürgen Thumann, president of the German Industry Federation (BDI).
At first glance, Schröder's economic record after seven years is grim. Germany has an unemployment rate of over 10 per cent, more than when Helmut Kohl ambled off into the sunset. Economic growth under Mr Schröder has averaged 1.2 per cent, lower than the last Kohl term.
The budget deficit this year is once again expected to breach the stability pact limit of 3 per cent of GDP and don't mention the plan to balance the budget by 2006.
The economy is caught in a vicious circle of growth rates that are too low to create jobs, and a fear of unemployment that itself chokes spending and growth.
The SPD's big election idea for the economy is to wait and see if recent reforms eventually kickstart growth. But the CDU election programme has a clear pro-business contour to it, cutting taxes and non-wage costs and loosening labour laws further, something companies have been demanding for years.
The CDU is promising a 100-day economic programme if it takes office, but observers are quick to point out that, in the consensual world of German politics, Dr Merkel is no union breaker like Margaret Thatcher.
Still, over half of 20,000 managers surveyed by Germany's chambers of industry and commerce (DIHK) think things will only pick up with a new CDU government.
But business leaders have been slow to warm to the CDU leader. A former scientist from East Germany, she is not the kind of politician they are used to dealing with. Dr Merkel has held frequent meetings with them to improve her standing and has appointed as her economic adviser the former chief executive of Siemens, Heinrich von Pierer.
The Achilles heel for the CDU in this election campaign has been taxation. Its manifesto promise of moderate tax cuts has been overshadowed by the 25 per cent flat tax proposal of university professor Paul Kirchhof, the man Angela Merkel brought on board for the campaign as her finance "visionary".
In doing so, she forgot the famous words of Helmut Kohl: "If you're having visions, go see a doctor." Chancellor Schröder pounced on Kirchhof and accused the CDU of wanting the millionaire and his cleaning lady to pay the same level of tax.
The SPD zoomed up in the polls and the CDU may now fall short of the votes needed to form a coalition with the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP), a guarantee of a reform-driven coalition. Instead the party could be forced into a grand coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD), a nightmare scenario for many German business leaders.
"I don't see anywhere in the CDU and SPD programmes where they could go in the same direction," said the BDI's Mr Thumann. "A grand coalition would just lead to huge rows and stagnation."
As Mr Schröder's days in the chancellery run down, several silver-lined clouds have appeared on the horizon.
On talk shows, the chancellor pulls out the recent issue of the Economist with the cover story on "Germany's Surprising Economy" above a picture of a Reich eagle flexing its muscles. Germany is the world's leading exporter for the third year in a row, with exports valued at €84.8 billion in the first half of 2005. This week, the World Bank praised Germany's reform efforts and added the country to its top 20 list of business-friendly economies.
"A lot has happened in Germany, particularly on the labour market. Compared to the reforms in other countries, that was quite a lot," said Mr Michael Klein, the vice-president of the World Bank.
But the praise is double-edged, with most experts in agreement that only Dr Merkel can push through the next stage of reforms.
"What could change under Merkel is that we would see economic politics done in one go, which would give us a completely new perspective on our problems," said Thomas Straubhaar of the HWWA think-tank.
"If I want to reform a business I need a plan. Germany needs a coherent package of what economic measures should happen, and when."
• 3 per cent "wealth" tax on incomes over €250,000
• Cut corporate tax from 25 to 19 per cent.
• Small changes to reforms
• Minimum wage
CDU
• VAT hike from 16 to 18 per cent to finance cut in employment taxes
• Income tax rates cut to 39 and 15 per cent
• Tax-free allowance of €8,000 per family member
• Close tax loopholes
• Abolish hire-fire laws in companies with up to 20 employees
• New low-wage jobs for low-qualified workers, partly state-financed
