The chairman of the German Federal Labor Agency, Detlef Scheele, said that the country needs thousands of guest workers to fill the gaps in the labor force as the population ages. This is reported by the newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung.
According to Detlef Scheele’s forecasts, the number of people of working age in Europe’s largest economy will decrease by almost 150 thousand in 2021. “In the coming years, everything will be much more dramatic,” the chairman of the Federal Labor Agency expects.
Scheele suggests that migrant workers, who are considered a problem by supporters of right-wing parties, are necessary to combat the shortage of labor. “We are not talking about granting asylum, but about targeted immigration to eliminate gaps in the labor market,” he said. “We need 400,000 immigrants a year, which is significantly more than in recent years,” Detlef Scheele said. “From nurses and climate specialists to logisticians and scientists, there will be a shortage of skilled workers everywhere.”
The population of Germany is 83 million people. Last year, the number of foreigners living in the country increased by about 204 thousand, which is 1.8 percent more than in the previous year.
Scheele’s comments came less than a month before the next national elections in Germany, which will be held on September 26. In 2015, many refugees and other migrants arrived in the country, which not all German citizens were happy about. When asked about the political resistance to the increase in immigrants, Detlef Scheele replied: “You can stand up and say,’ We don’t want foreigners, ‘ but that’s not how it works.”
The far-right Alternative for Germany party opposed Scheele’s ” incomprehensible demand”. MP Rene Springer accused him of “becoming the mouthpiece of companies that want to further reduce wages through immigration.” Alternative for Germany was the third-largest in the parliament, which will be re-elected in the autumn. The German Chancellor will also be replaced: Angela Merkel has said that she will not participate in the upcoming elections.
