Just to put some numbers up for a simple example (which would be typical for someone working in IT in this region)
(Situation: 32 Years old, Unmarried, no children, living in Stuttgart, Germany, Monthly values):

Pre-tax income: 4.666,67 €
Taxes
Solidaritätszuschlag 52,05 €
(Tax for rebuilding of eastern Germany after reunification)
Kirchensteuer: 75,71 €
(church tax)
Income Tax: 946,33 €
Social Security expenses
retirement fund: 436,33 €
unemployment insurance: 70,00 €
health insurance: 355,95 €
extended care insurance: 60,38 €
(formatting killed by Shlashdots "use fewer junk characters" rule)

Net income: 2.669,91 €
(this is the amount paid to your account, everything above will be deducted from your pay before paid out to you.
Everything on this list excluding church tax is state mandated and can't be removed or negotiated off, except in special situations, due to german tax laws)

No, to put it into perspective, power in Germany costs about double than in the US - I pay around 0.30€/0.40$ for power per kw/h in Germany, and I'm with the cheapest provider for the whole region...

You are aware that they already did the landing (albeit in water) on CRS-3 with a fully orbit-capable production Falcon9(R-dev)? They turned around, slowed down, and soft-landed in the water, exactly what was planned for that flight. The next one will be on water again, but aims closer to the cape, and so on. It is an iterative concept... and, what you said Falcon9R does not do (and is a scam for it) it will do later when they have the new test site in texas ready to go, which they are currently lacking permissions to use.

TL;DR: They are doing what they said they were doing, and they incrementally increase the height/flight paths of the rockets.

It will do so when they have the permission to fly out of McGregor, where the Falcon9 Dev-2 will be stationed. Where they are right now, they are not allowed to do acutal launches, so they have to wait.

Also, they test on production flights right now, see CRS-3 last time or the upcoming AsiaSat flight in a few days.

This is wrong, they said specifically that they aim to land back at the launch site, for quick refuel/restart (less than 24h turnover in production). No plans to return to other pads and carry via road/waterway.

Well, you generalize way too much - maybe they do where YOU live/study.. they sure as hell did not where I went to university / high school..

Back where I live (southwestern Germany), we have a Cable ISP that is the pure internet goodness in 99% of all cases..

this is their top-tier plan:

Internet Access (150Mbit Down / 5Mbit Up)
Landline + Flatrate
HD-PVR
some PayTV Packets

all inclusive: 47€/Month ($63 US, including taxes)
Oh, and obviously, they don't do any metering on traffic.

yeah, at this point it is more resignation about the last ~50 Years of german government officials than anything else.. especially Merkel ..our "Flag in the wind".. turns wherever the wind blows..

Just to clarify: That were personal, individual reactions in forums as gizmodo etc., commenting on news - not in the news themselves.

..to this lately, and most of them were in the "We are big, bad, mean motherfuckers so of course we do this and if you don't like it go fuck yourself or we nuke you" (paraphrased, not literally uttered.. even though nuclear weapons HAVE been mentioned once or twice in the discussion.. I think it was on gizmodo or some site like that..)

Guys, just turn around the situation and it would be China doing the same in the US.. wouldn't your outcry be as big as ours (German here), maybe even bigger?

Just because you have the biggest guns doesn't mean laws are not for you anymore, just as a reminder..

Also, having the biggest Aircraft Carrier in the block means nothing, if you actually would take on an opponent that can fight back.. (I've read up on a lot of NATO maneuvers where even our old diesel subs blatantly sunk US carriers and the commanders didn't even believe the sub commanders that they were there, until they surfaced like 500 feet away from the carrier in full broadside view of the torpedo tubes..)

Really, if you ask me, as a German with a strong national pride myself, the only political answer to this would be simple (and something our corrupt and incompetent government would NEVER do..): close all US bases on German soil, including Ramstein etc., remove every single American non-civilian personell from the country immediately..

and while we're at it consider if this constitutes an "armed" (as in cyber-warfare) attack against Germany (and our Allies) as based on NATO Article 5 (Casus foederis).

Also, leaving NATO would be another option.

Well, sorry to correct you, but SpaceX does not "require" the robot arm to berth with the station (this Mode of Operation is called Berthing, not Docking), but rather NASA requires SpaceX to not DOCK but berth with the Station to minimize the chance of a vehicle on fully auto without a crew going haywire and damaging the Station - the Dragon would/will be fully capable of Docking, NASA just doesn't want them to.

Well, you can.. there is some web magic around already that lets you add a "run at logon" script that opens the Desktop "App" bypassing the metro launch screen and also the swipe to unlock screen.. and if you install start8 from stardock you don't have to bother using metro for the basic tasks.. but as soon as you change stuff (that includes joining a wlan, that is metro now too..the volume slider isn't though) and have to use the control panel, you're back to metro.

That was in the DP, not in the CP - they actually removed the Registry key, and multiple times have stated that there will be no official way to get rid of metro.

So you know, yes it was already roughly converted into dollars :) If you scroll down a bit, I added a bit more information down in the thread as well..

Well, if you want a rundown .. (Anonymous coward here, just didn't have my login creds at work..):
I live in Germany, Stuttgart, in the City center, and I have roughly the following col: (all monthly quotes, converted from Euro to $)
3 Room, 700sqft -> $950 (including heating, fees, etc)
Power -> $90
50Mbit Cable -> $40
Car Insurance -> $100
Gas (at $8/gal..) -> $250
Insurance (non-medi) -> $60
Food -> $250 (including eating at our cafeteria at work)
Of course I have a lot of other positions to take care of, but this is just to give you an overview on my cost of living on the salary stated above..

Oh, and for your added benefit, some information on how we are taxed in Germany, example me (not married , no kids):
Income: 5516 USD
Work Tax: 1223 USD
Solidarity Tax (to rebuild Eastern Germany): 60 USD
Church Tax: 89 USD
Healthcare: 415 USD
Retirement: 540 USD
Unemployment Insurance: 83 USD
Pay after taxes (all above are mandatory): 3106 USD