The improvement of integration (especially declared not just in words) of immigrants in the labor market not only reduces the shortage of personnel but also increases tax revenues, as well as stabilizes the social insurance system, which is under pressure from expected demographic changes. For the German labor market has faced serious challenges primarily because of the progressive aging of the population, which requires systemic reforms.
In March of the current year, the number of workers making mandatory contributions to social insurance turned out to be 0.2% lower than last year’s indicator, despite the fact that the number of employed foreign citizens substantially increased — by 3.4%. In the final analysis, the economy was deprived of 75 thousand insured workers in one year, state the authors of the study from Gütersloh.
At the same time, many spheres of activity in the country already now depend on immigration. According to the presented data, almost half of the employees in the sphere of cleaning services have foreign citizenship (47.5%). In the production of food products, this indicator constitutes about 44%, and in the sphere of tourism and gastronomy — 36%. Even in the sector of care for the sick and elderly people, which is experiencing an acute shortage of personnel, more than every fifth employee arrived from abroad.
In the upcoming years, this trend will intensify by virtue of structural demographic shifts. Every fourth working citizen of Germany now is older than 55 years and will retire within the next decade. On the contrary, foreign workers in the country are significantly younger: among them, the share of older persons constitutes only slightly more than 12%.
In Germany, More Than One Million Jobs Remain Vacant
“Statistical data visually show: without a substantial influx of immigrants, many branches will find themselves in a crisis situation,” as explained by the analyst of the foundation on labor market issues, Tobias Ortmann. Even taking into account that in some places a reduction of staff is taking place, more than 1 million jobs are still free in the country.
Earlier, our editorial office already wrote about the main reasons for the stagnation of jobs, and the problem is not in the heads of companies and even not in the shortage of professional personnel — all questions go to HRs, who suddenly decided that it is precisely they who manage companies and personnel. This rather new profession began to impose its rules of recruitment on managers, kowtowing to unneeded quotas. In the end, businesses close because of a shortage of qualified and motivated personnel, businessmen think that the problem is in the applicants, and applicants sit in the Job Center, receive benefits, and think that the problem is in the employers. At the same time, Job Centers also do not fulfill their duties and do not place applicants into work, do not interest employers in giving preference to those who are registered as unemployed.
In the end, we have what we have.
For the preservation of the well-being of society, it is necessary to raise the quality of integration of specialists arriving in Germany. In the opinion of analysts, the necessity has ripened to return the discussion about immigration into an objective channel and proceed to large-scale reforms.
A significant unused potential, according to the materials of the study, is hidden among immigrated persons, who much less frequently have official employment with the payment of insurance contributions in comparison with people possessing German citizenship. In addition, foreign specialists often labor in positions that do not correspond to the level of their real qualification.
In particular, among working citizens of Germany, only about 12% are occupied in positions of assistants and unskilled laborers. Among employees with foreign citizenship, this indicator reaches almost 36%. Moreover, even among foreigners who have a higher education, 12.5% are forced to perform work that does not require high qualification. And again, the question is why HRs do not consider the education, experience, and skills of a person, but consider gender, nationality, skin color, and knowledge of German in counterweight to knowledge of 3–4 foreign languages. What kind of mind must an HR possess not to understand that if a person knows 4 languages, then they will quickly learn German too, whereas they cannot find such a specialist among the German-speaking population for years, and are unlikely to find one.
The Significance of Language Skills and the Recognition of Foreign Diplomas
Language support is named the most important tool for changing the situation. Good command of the German language raises the chances for employment, noted in the foundation. But in the Foundation they apparently do not know about the quality of teaching in language schools, and that the best place for learning a language is work. Proven by centuries, but not by young experts living in their own soap bubble.
For this reason, it is required to ensure reliable financing of language courses (where to add more, as it is, most of the money goes to scammers — ed), having tied them with programs for raising qualifications and the provision of places in children’s preschool institutions, including for citizens who have already started labor activity.
A no less important factor is the procedure for the recognition of diplomas and confirmation of professional experience. Many immigrants arrive with a ready qualification but for years do not have the legal possibility to apply it in practice. The question to HRs, why the researchers lost sight of this — is not clear.
Long procedures for considering petitions for asylum and the absence of clear perspectives regarding the right to stay in the country also drag out the process of employment and reduce the interest of employers.
To this are added the problems of interaction at the junction of running affairs by migration services and structures for employment. An employee of the foundation, Roman Wink, pointed to the necessity of creating unified service centers for foreign workers.
Questions of learning the language, bureaucratic procedures, and childcare must be combined into a continuous and consistent integration chain capable of preventing long-term economic losses.
On the other hand, until at the state and business level they understand where the hotbed of the problem hides, i.e., in HRs and their approaches to the selection of personnel in Germany, until they understand that Job Centers must place people into work, interest employers in giving preference to workers registered in the Job Center, under the condition that their qualification will be no worse than the qualification of ordinary job applicants — the problem will not be solved. For in other countries, even in the country most jealous toward foreigners — Israel, such a problem has not existed for a long time already. But we are in Germany. And the time has come to change something. No?
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