Skills shortage rises to record level

Enlarge image

Cloakroom in a day care center: educators are among the specialists who are urgently needed

Photo: Philipp von Ditfurth / picture alliance / dpa

Although the economy in Germany was under pressure from the corona pandemic and Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine, the shortage of skilled workers reached a record level in the first quarter of this year.

In March, the number of vacancies, for which there were no suitably qualified unemployed nationwide, rose to a new high of a good 558,000, reported the Competence Center for Securing Skilled Workers (Kofa).

This means that the gap in skilled workers has increased by a further 88,000 vacancies within just three months.

The Kofa is operated on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Economics by the employer-oriented Institute of German Economics (IW).

It collects data from the Federal Employment Agency (BA) and its research facility, the Institute for Employment Research (IAB), the Federal Institute for Vocational Training and the Federal Statistical Office.

According to the study, the growing shortage of skilled workers is affecting the entire labor market.

However, the bottlenecks are particularly pronounced in two areas:

• health, social affairs, teaching and education

• Construction, architecture, surveying and building technology.

According to the study, a good six out of ten positions could not be filled with suitably qualified unemployed people in March alone in the areas of health, social affairs, teaching and education.

According to the study, the shortage of skilled workers is also above average in the sectors of raw material extraction, production and manufacturing, natural sciences, geography and IT as well as agriculture, forestry and animal husbandry as well as horticulture.

The number of vacancies for qualified applicants in the fields of aviation and energy technology has recently also increased significantly.

An important reason for the increasing shortage not only of skilled workers but of workers in general is demographic change.

Year after year, more and more older people leave the labor market at retirement than young people enter it.

fdi/dpa