Thing is, depending on where exactly you live, you probably need to own a car anyway. In that case, you need to compare gas vs train tickets alone. And there the car still wins easily. If you factor in comfort and convenience, the gap only widens.
If you don’t need to have a car already, then the train is cheaper, yes, but that only works if you live in the cities.
When factoring in all the costs associated with owning a car, public transport is usually quite a bit cheaper than private cars, even in Germany.
Thing is, depending on where exactly you live, you probably need to own a car anyway. In that case, you need to compare gas vs train tickets alone. And there the car still wins easily. If you factor in comfort and convenience, the gap only widens. If you don’t need to have a car already, then the train is cheaper, yes, but that only works if you live in the cities.
77% of Germans live in cities or dense areas. Those generally have pretty good public transport, so maybe ¼th of Germans need to “own a car anyway”.