The point about correct use being a status thing is such a good point, that you almost never see mentioned, but definitely feel it.
Recently I saw a discussion on Reddit where the author made a minor mistake in the title, that sounds perfectly fine and understandable to me, as a non-native speaker. They used "Mit was" instead of "womit". And more than half the comments were people pointing out the mistake and making fun of the person due to it, rather than engage in the topic that was raised in the first place.
You don't magically get language skills by living in the country. You still have to put in the time and effort.
The utmost basics, A1, you could learn very quickly and those will get you through basic interactions (buying groceries, greeting neighbors, etc.)
At work, doctors, apartment search etc. you can use English.
For contracts you can use translate, since B1 wouldn't get you far there anyway.
But to get to B1, you would have to make language learning your hobby for at least a year... and that is not for everyone. Especially given that there aren't interesting media to immerse yourself into in German, compared to other languages like Japanese or Korean.
The only thing that I find puzzling is that OP didn't learn it, when they plan to stay in the country and obtain permanent residency. I would understand not learning the language if they planned to move out in 1 year.
I live in Austria, and from my experience it's the higher management that is almost exclusively native Austrians. But the highest (C-level) and lowest (IC-level) staff is international.
I was under the impression that English speaking countries are by far the most desirable for immigrants.
Most people don't care that the current US, or UK governments are a mess, because grass isn't exactly greener back at home.
And there are quite a few more English speaking countries that have their own issues, but don't get so much negative press online. (Ireland and Canada have housing crisis, but sound fine otherwise. Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand surely have their own issues that I don't know about)
It's less of a basic decency if you're in a country where almost everyone is fluent in English, you get by your life just fine in English, speaking the local language doesn't open new doors, as you're not going to be "native level" speaker no matter how much you study (and many would prefer to speak English with you if you have less than native level of German), learning the local language would take many years of continuous time and effort that could be spent elsewhere, and in the end you're not even sure how many more years you want to stay before leaving.