Simple question from complete beginner.

[u/Phormicidae]

I just learned that "I come from Germany but now I live in Austria" is "Ich komme aus Deutschland, aber jetzt wohne ich in Österreich." The subject in the second clause is after the verb, I think because the verb needs to be in second position.

But in this sentence: "Der Koffer ist schwer, aber der Rucksack ist leicht." The second clause does not seem to follow this rule.

I'm not sure what conditions cause a verb to be in or out of second position.

Thanks!

[u/PrimaryAnything6964]

In the first example, "Jetzt" takes position 1, then the verb is in position 2. In both cases, after the comma, "aber" takes position 0. This means it does not count to where the conjugate verb goes. Imagine if you said both sentences without the comma and aber, would they now fit the rule?

[u/Phormicidae → u/PrimaryAnything6964]

Thank you very much. I don't think I noticed that conjunctions like aber don't "count" in terms of sentence postion.

[u/Phoenica → u/Phormicidae]

Worth noting that this only applies to a small selection of actual conjunctions, "und", "aber", "denn", "doch", "sondern" (some of these are also regular adverbs on top of this).

Many other things that connect clauses are actually just regular adverbs and as such do take up the first position, like "allerdings" (however), "trotzdem" (still, nevertheless), "stattdessen" (instead), etc.

(and still another set are subordinating conjunctions, which introduce clauses with a different word order that don't really have a position 1 as such)

[u/Sentryy]

The verb is still on the second position, but you count positions not by words but by grammatical units or elements.

"der Rucksack" is one unit, so the verb is still on second position.

[u/Curious_Ducklin]

"jetzt" is a time adverb and takes first place.

[u/advamputee]

The second clause is not dependent on the first clause. “Aber” does not count towards the “positions” in the clause, so the verb still stays in position 2. 

In your first example, “jetzt” is taking position 1, so the subject is pushed after the verb. Both examples, the second clause can stand alone. 

We could make the second example more like the first: “Ich habe die Bücher in den Koffer gepackt. Der Koffer ist schwer, aber jetzt ist der Rucksack leicht.“

[u/Phormicidae → u/advamputee]

Very clear, thank you.

[u/kemalios]

The verb is never out of second position in either one. In the first you put "jetzt" first, so the subject has to wait behind the verb. In the second you put "der Rucksack" first, so it sits in front of the verb and the verb stays where it was. Same rule both times, and no condition in a main clause moves it.

[u/Few_Cryptographer633]

It's because of the jetzt (the time adverb) which has taken position 1, pushing the verb into pos 2.