onemark

As long as you can prove in black and white that you have paid these bills, you should be OK. (It might not be easy but you should be OK.)

Work in progress, then.

@ someone's daughter: 1. I am a freelancer when I speak English and a Freiberufler when I speak German. 2. I may be an Einzelunternehmer but as I said above, I didn't have to form a company. 3. As a freelancer I do not have a company, I have a business. There's a slight difference.

Wottabout manipulating DNA to prevent any number of diseases or handicaps?

Right. I am a freelancer and I have never had to form any kind of company with any city business ofice (Gewerbeamt) here in Germany. Consequently, I pay no business tax (not "trade tax"), nor am I a member of the IHK. I had to inform the inland revenue authorities as I needed a different income tax number and later got a VAT no. (Mehrtwertsteuer-Nr.). Any my accountant files my tax returns electronically. German tax law is famously complicated and my accountant is well worth the money. And no, "freelancer" is not any kind of legal term here in Germany, if only because it is an English word. However, the word "Freiberufler" is a legal term for the reasons given above. 

The term "playing God" seems to be almost infinitely flexible in terms of its definition - take the abortion debate as a classic example. And of course, many people are genuinely scared of creating what they imagine to be "Frankenstein"-type monsters/beings and / or (understandably in Germany) some form of "super human" ("Übermensch"), however these are defined. However, I personally have no problem about manipulating human DNA in order to prevent children being born with diseases or physical or mental disorders/handicaps, if this prevents some measure of human misery.

If you are a freelancer, you do not have to form / register a company in the city/town where you live. That is important, not least because you would not then have to pay any business tax or join the Chamber of Commerce (normally compulsory but freelancers are exempted. [It's a ****ing scam but that's another story.]). See: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freier_Beruf_(Deutschland) (Sorry, German only.)

@ theGman: I don't usually subscribe to this point of view myself and I don't think I do here. As far as I am concerned, anything that can prevent the spread of AIDS is OK with me. Of more concern to me is that this technique does not appear to have been subjected to peer review, which would imply that it is "technically unproven", or whatever the scientific term is.

The issues seem to be: 1. the fact that this technique (or whatever it is called) has not been subjected to any kind of peer review and 2. the fact that man seems to be "playing God", which is felt to be unethical. But I stand to be corrected.

I don't know whether there is any formal requirement but I wouldn't bother.

@ WanWhiteWolf: Why exactly do you consider Germany to be a semi-comunist country?

There is something inherently wrong about being required to pay for a service that you do not use at all if you have neither a radio, TV nor an internet-capable PC. Such situations are admittedly rare but they still occur. 

@ acton (6 November): Is applying for German citizenship a realistic option for you?

Is it in?

@ skdb: I'm curious: if you're British, are you not entitled to German citizenship? Or are you choosing for various reasons not to take this option?   (FTR I have both British and Irish citizenships.)