That is not a German proverb. It is the punchline to a joke about the attitude differences between Germans and Austrians.

The Austrians find the joke so funny that multiple people told me the first or second time I was here in 1989 or 90. One guy loved the joke so much that he repeated it about every ~2 years for the next 10+ years until he retired.

I can't speak with any authority about the entire of the USSR, but in Czechoslovakia, according to my many older family and friends, it was difficult to get ahead without connections, but the average worker was taken care of and thus the vast majority of the population - who are average workers - got along OK.

I know that my wife outside Prague had many social programs from the government - and thus in some very important ways a higher quality of life - with her working class parents (dad finished high school, mom did not) than I did in Wisconsin and Minnesota with my college educated parents.