EN 
DE 
Matthias Puppe
Gütersloh/Leipzig. Without significant immigration, Germany will lose a considerable part of its workforce in the coming decades. This is according to a study published by the Bertelsmann Foundation on Tuesday. In Saxony alone, the proportion of the workforce will decrease by almost ten percent by 2040. At the same time, however, many jobs will also be lost in the east, write the two authors Alexander Kubis (Institute for Labor Market Research) and Lutz Schneider (University of Coburg). The study speaks of hundreds of thousands of jobs that will disappear by 2040.
The West will not be spared from this development by 2040, partly as a result of digitalization and decarbonization. However, the two authors also forecast a significant increase in new jobs in Bavaria, North Rhine-Westphalia and Baden-Württemberg, for example. Overall, the number of workers will also decrease there, but less in percentage terms than in the east.
Bertelsmann study: Development of labor force potential 2040
without immigration
According to the study, the already rather "small labor markets" in eastern Germany will lose a great deal of potential in the coming decades due to demographic change. In addition to the ten percent in Saxony, there are 18 percent each in Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt. However, the development will not only affect the number of workers. "Although the potential workforce is falling very sharply in the eastern German states, the demand for workers is also falling to an even greater extent," write the two authors.
Shrinkage leads to further shrinkage
The reason for this is a kind of downward spiral in which large parts of eastern Germany find themselves. "A rapidly shrinking population needs fewer local services and buys fewer regionally produced products. This lower consumer demand leads to a lower demand for labor in a region," say Kubis and Schneider. Shrinkage always leads to further shrinkage. Specifically, there is talk of 180,000 jobs being lost by 2040 in Thuringia, for example, and almost 300,000 in Saxony. Only a small number of new jobs will be created by then.
Despite the decreasing number of workers, this will lead to a surplus compared to the actual demand in companies. In Saxony, there is talk of 12.4 percent more workers than the market needs by 2040, in Saxony-Anhalt it is expected to be 18 percent more and in Brandenburg almost 30 percent.
Study: Companies relocate production - workers migrate
In other regions, particularly in western Germany, the future looks better in this respect, not least due to the almost constant demand for labor. The authors assume that this will once again trigger processes within Germany: Companies will withdraw their production from areas with a shortage of skilled workers; on the other hand, people will be mobile and then migrate to regions with high demand - similar to what happened in the 1990s and 2000s.
However, this intra-German exchange will not be enough to compensate for the widening gap in the German labor market. Specifically, the authors assume a need for 45.7 million employees in 2040, but without immigration, only 41.9 million would be available nationwide.
In order to prevent the potential labor force from collapsing to such an extent, around 288,000 immigrants need to come to Germany every year. Taking into account an unemployment rate of three percent, there will still be enough workers in the country in 2040 and 2060. For comparison: last year, 350,000 people applied for asylum in Germany nationwide, this year there were 218,000 applications by the end of October. However, almost half of all applications are rejected on average.
The complete study on the web: www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de
