Earlier quoted context omitted.
What does your vision of perfect solar power look like? And within that vision, is a free person still able to decide for themselves if they want to buy a solar panel to hang on their balcony?
People are entitled to do as they want, even if it's not profitable. I am just pointing out that if the economics of this add up, people have been seriously let down by their governments.
Now, sure: That quick payoff is only possible because electricity in Germany is very expensive, but there's reasons for that, too: Unlike some nations, Germany isn't sitting on a ton of high-quality fossil fuels.
They do have lots of lignite, and they do mine it and use it, but lignite is so low-energy that transportation becomes a serious financial burden: A train full of lignite can cost more to move around than it can produce, Joule per Joule. They've solved some of that problem by putting power plants right next to the mines (which is smart: build transmission lines instead of rail lines!), but their domestic fossil fuel resources are not a matter of policy. They're limited to whatever they have in the ground.
And for reasons that must make sense to someone, they've completely phased out their domestic nuclear power. (I'm not interested in discussing whether that's good or bad, but it remains fact.)
As far as I can tell, electrical production and distribution in Germany is comprised of a mixture of private entities (eg, companies with profit motive) and public (government-operated) entities -- similar to how it is where I am here in the States, and also where you are in Australia.
And quite clearly: The private entities are obviously interested in maximizing their potential profit. They are, after all, principally in the business of making money.
It's easy to say that it's a governmental failure that ultimately allows balcony solar to have such a quick return... but private enterprise is also involved, so they get to share the blame as well.
If it is profitable to do solar power at utility scale, in Germany, then: Why isn't more of it being done? If the answer is "just rent a few thousand hectares at a few hundred euros per year and cover it all with solar," then why does the private sector not cash in on all the easy money of utility-scale solar power?