That's roughly it, 1.5K euros is not a lot. If you simply lost your job and went on social benefits, you would get 500€ + Rent from the state, so I don't think for many there is a good reason to have a job paying that low. The inflation is also eating up the savings of many of the lower class, so they're also looking to earn more. The upper management class in germany is however frighteningly conservative about raising wages aggressively.
The minimum wage is 2080 euro / month in Germany, so anybody offering you less than that is not following labor laws.
The unemployment rate is ~3.0%, so the shortage is not due to salary.
The population is growing old, there is a huge influx of high-skilled people, and the young have access to good education: this means that there are a lot of new job created by high earners, but there aren't enough people to work them all.
The difference is gross and net. 2080 € for 40 h is the gross wage, and only since last October (before it was 1800 €).
I can't say much about low-skilled jobs, but in the last couple of years it has been hard to hire developers and electronics engineers. Not neccessarily due to a lack of people, but because many companies don't want to or can't spend enough money to attract talent.
A bunch of these employers are paying as much as they can. One I know can't legally offer more, and others are said to be offering enough that their projected profits will be zero in 2023.
That's worse. If companies are unable to adjust salaries to match increases in overall costs without fulfilling their primary purpose, then it suggests that the entire economic system is dysfunctional.
It's ridiculous how much wages have stagnated here in Germany even with sky high energy prices and inflation. I feel like I am the only one who asks for "more" and hence in many places just after or during HR interview they would flat out reject me. I have had few interviews where HR said I am out of their budget. With 10 years of experience asking anything near 100K makes you look like "greedy" in their eyes.
That's what every labour shortage I've ever heard of actually seems to mean. The strangest part is that this seems like basic capitalist dogma -- "businesses compete via wages to attract skilled workers", and if they don't, they don't get any -- but neither the media nor the hardheaded forum-warriors wielding FACTS and LOGIC seem to understand it in that way.
My "cynical" take is that these are the market wages, because the MBAs seem to see paying people as a cost centre. Why not just convince the remaining workers to work several times harder? What do you mean we can't seem to prevent prospective hires from noticing the death-march atmosphere?
Well, food is my cost centre. I should come in to a restaurant with €1 and expect to be fed. When I get kicked out, I'll just call it food shortage!
It smells to me like „market for me, but not for thee“. Does labour have market force to set wages? Nah, if they try to do that.. Let's either import products by removing import taxes or import more labour. But god forbid somebody tries to do anything about pricing...
i am egyptian, and i can tell for a while now germany have been getting the cream of the crop from egypt, mainly engineers, programmers and to a large extent medical doctors and pharmacists (although doctors have a slight preference to UK, many still go to germany)
and german have also for a while replaced french as the second most popular foreign language ( english is the first foreign language)
and compared to france for example, germany have a good rep, if you are good you will be promote to management and leadership, in france companies (the reputation is) there is a limit to how far up you can go
Higher wages will attract workers from other companies/sectors. Those companies that can't pay market wage will have to automate or raise prices. Or cut profits..
This is just what the biting edge of demographic collapse looks like. Inflation, economic stagnation and yet perpetually tight labor market because there are not enough young workers to support steady state demand.
Germany has one of the worst demographics that means people are mass retiring with plump pension plans but there are not enough younger workers to replace them reducing productivity and taxes. So either the retirees give up their pensions or the workers get shafted with higher taxes. US has this problem too, but in the European welfare state this is much more acute. In the middle of this, Germany has to re-build its decayed Armed forces given the war in Europe.
If you are economic immigrant to Germany make it transitionary, your ultimate destination should be preferably outside of Europe.
Peter Zeihan has been making a big deal about this decade being the beginning of demographic decline for Germany and many Boomber-dominated countries; their population curves have inverted pyramid shapes from the elderly down to children.
The Boomers are beginning to retire, switching from mainly producers to consumers, and there aren't enough in later generations to replace them.
Perhaps this helps explain the very welcoming immigration policy of Germany, and less so for France which has a more stable chimney shape.
I am German. Indeed the German population is quite old, and employers prefer young workers. I think other factors (or overlooked groups) to be considered are:
Many family men and women in prime working age are not willing to move. The housing market is stressed (rents are exploding everywhere). Often Middle-Aged Germans must do caretaking work for old parents, and cannot move for this reason.
Many non-family-starting Germans (from all age groups) are living in single-person households. Although if they are unemployed and able to move where the work is, many don't. Because of these people are prosperous, or are prosperous enough for a while. And they often have skills from previous careers. They just not need to take any unrelated job. So they can afford to wait and choose.
These highly skilled people in demand have enough wealth (savings and inherited wealth) and even enough income to get along, even though they _could_ make more money elsewhere. So they are also not on the job market.
Even if they did a retraining and pivoting, then many employers do not want to hire them permanently or not at all. Temporary or precarious jobs are the increasingly common here, no end in sight.
So… I’ve been reading The End of the World is Just the Beginning… in it he keeps talking about the aging population in Germany, China, Japan, etc and how this is going to lead to mass labor issues among other problems. Seems like I’ve seen similar headlines about other countries this week, so maybe there’s more structural issues going on here
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 19.4 ms ] threadPerhaps there isn't ... The destruction of Europe has been grossly exaggerated.
- They do not expect to pay more than ~1.5K Euros per months (sometimes lower) for most usual service or construction jobs.
- They do not find people ready to work for ~1.5K Euros per month
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agenda_2010
As WP notes "Some scientists see the wage depression in Germany fostered by the Agenda 2010 as one of the causes of the European debt crisis."
The unemployment rate is ~3.0%, so the shortage is not due to salary.
The population is growing old, there is a huge influx of high-skilled people, and the young have access to good education: this means that there are a lot of new job created by high earners, but there aren't enough people to work them all.
I can't say much about low-skilled jobs, but in the last couple of years it has been hard to hire developers and electronics engineers. Not neccessarily due to a lack of people, but because many companies don't want to or can't spend enough money to attract talent.
A bunch of these employers are paying as much as they can. One I know can't legally offer more, and others are said to be offering enough that their projected profits will be zero in 2023.
My "cynical" take is that these are the market wages, because the MBAs seem to see paying people as a cost centre. Why not just convince the remaining workers to work several times harder? What do you mean we can't seem to prevent prospective hires from noticing the death-march atmosphere?
It smells to me like „market for me, but not for thee“. Does labour have market force to set wages? Nah, if they try to do that.. Let's either import products by removing import taxes or import more labour. But god forbid somebody tries to do anything about pricing...
If your unions haven't been systematically gutted for a century, then yes, to some degree.
and german have also for a while replaced french as the second most popular foreign language ( english is the first foreign language)
and compared to france for example, germany have a good rep, if you are good you will be promote to management and leadership, in france companies (the reputation is) there is a limit to how far up you can go
If you are economic immigrant to Germany make it transitionary, your ultimate destination should be preferably outside of Europe.
The Boomers are beginning to retire, switching from mainly producers to consumers, and there aren't enough in later generations to replace them.
Perhaps this helps explain the very welcoming immigration policy of Germany, and less so for France which has a more stable chimney shape.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Germany
Many family men and women in prime working age are not willing to move. The housing market is stressed (rents are exploding everywhere). Often Middle-Aged Germans must do caretaking work for old parents, and cannot move for this reason.
Many non-family-starting Germans (from all age groups) are living in single-person households. Although if they are unemployed and able to move where the work is, many don't. Because of these people are prosperous, or are prosperous enough for a while. And they often have skills from previous careers. They just not need to take any unrelated job. So they can afford to wait and choose.
These highly skilled people in demand have enough wealth (savings and inherited wealth) and even enough income to get along, even though they _could_ make more money elsewhere. So they are also not on the job market.
Even if they did a retraining and pivoting, then many employers do not want to hire them permanently or not at all. Temporary or precarious jobs are the increasingly common here, no end in sight.