some of the East German working class now think they were better off when the wall was up
Why? Because communism removed the desire to be productive and to strive to be better, as people sat back and waited for the state to redistribute what it had stolen from the people. Everyone apart from the ruling elite, the Honeckers and the Ulbrichts, was in sheltered employment, a brain surgeon earned only fractionally more than a cleaner or a clerk, and ambition was killed.
Now it's survival of the fittest, and those conditioned by years of communism can't make it.