Migration of Hungarians to Germany to slow down

The German labour market is in excellent shape despite the number of refugees Germany took in and the constant flow of Eastern-Europeans, says privatbankar.hu. The number of Hungarians is increasing, but the increase is slower than earlier. It is already known how many Hungarians were unemployed in Germany in April.

The German press reports that the German labour market is still in an excellent shape. In the last 25 years this April has the fewest unemployed, only 2.569 million people were looking for job, which is less by 175 thousands than in the previous year. The unemployment rate is 5.8.

The following report about the Eastern-European employees – more precisely about those 15 countries which got into the German labour market during the many-stage enlargement of the EU – was published recently. Those 15 countries contain the seven countries joining the EU with Hungary, namely the PIGS (Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain), Romania, Bulgaria and Croatia.

According to the Federal Employment Agency (Bundesagentur für Arbeit), 99,397 Hungarian citizens were employed in Germany in February, which is a little less than in its peak in November (100,836 people), but by hundreds more than in the previous month. (In the winter, in December and January it is usual that the number of employees decreases seasonally.) This is by 8,742 more than it was last year, which shows a slowing tendency: there has been periods when in two following years the number of new employees was over 15 thousands.

The following chart shows the number of Hungarian employees in Germany with the white line representing the Hungarians, while the black line representing all the 15 mentioned countries. The horizontal axis stands for the months, while the vertical axis on the left represents the number of Hungarians and on the right the number of people from the 15 countries altogether.

In one year’s time 272 thousands people arrived at the German labour market from the already mentioned 15 countries and from other ones – containing the refugees as well -, which is a 13 per cent enlargement. The number of unemployed people increased by 12 per cent among foreigners, while the number of poeple entitled to financial support increased by 47 per cent, which means by 429 thousands people.

While the number of employees coming from EU countries increased by 14 per cent (152 thousands people), the number of unemployed people among them increased by only 1.8 per cent, and the number of people entitled to financial support by only 6.5 per cent. The number of Hungarian unemployed people was 11,569 in April.

The number of employed refugees also increased by 48 per cent, but this is still very low as it means only 59 thousands people.

Bavarian conservative and Christian democratic politician (CSU) Horst Seehofer has recently urged the strengthening of the guarding of the borders. Der Speigel wrote he would keep the refugees away from Germany and would entrust them to the care of Italy and Greece.

The following chart shows the increase of the number of Hungarian employees in Germany compared to the same months of the preceding years. The horizontal axis stands for the months, while the vertical axis represents the number of people.