Economists agree: If Germany wants to get the increasing shortage of skilled workers under control, it needs reinforcements from outside. Economist Monika Schnitzer has just said that 1.5 million immigrants per year are necessary just to keep the number of workers constant. Germany urgently needs a “welcome culture” for this, emphasizes Schnitzer, who heads the Council of Economic Experts.
But it is precisely this welcoming culture that the Germans apparently largely lack. This is shown by a current report by the organization InterNations, a global network of expats, i.e. people living and working abroad. According to this, Germany is one of the least attractive countries in the world for expats: In the ranking of 53 host countries, Germany came in 49th place.
For the “Expat Insider 2023” study, a total of 12,000 people who live and work abroad were asked about various aspects of their lives. Respondents were of 171 different nationalities and lived in 172 different countries. Only countries in which at least 50 expats could be interviewed were included in the ranking.
Around 1,000 foreign expats were surveyed in Germany, with the respondents tending to belong to the well-educated. Many of them have found a job in Germany on their own initiative and work in sectors such as IT, manufacturing and engineering or in the financial sector.
The evaluation of the results shows: In Germany, the respondents find it particularly difficult to settle in and find social connections. In Germany, for example, 55 percent of those surveyed said it was difficult to build friendships with locals – in other countries only 36 percent said so. 32 percent of expats in Germany have no personal social network (24 percent worldwide).
Particularly frightening: 30 percent think that Germans are generally not friendly to foreign fellow citizens. This value is also significantly higher than in other countries – worldwide the value is only 18 percent. As a result, every third expat in Germany does not feel at home, worldwide it is only every fifth.
The following answers show how the lack of a welcoming culture is received by those affected:
Many newcomers feel lost not only on a human level, but also in the practical things of everyday life. When it comes to digital infrastructure, administration, housing and language barriers, Germany performs worse overall than any other country in the ranking.
58 percent of expats in Germany have problems finding an apartment, compared to an average of only 31 percent worldwide. 56 percent have problems dealing with the German authorities (38 percent worldwide) and half find it difficult to live here without knowing the national language (only one in three worldwide).
In addition, many expats in this country despair of setting up fast internet access and the lack of cashless payment options. “It’s often impossible to pay by card. Digitization ‘made in Germany’ is a joke,” says a study participant from France.
On the other hand, expats in Germany give very good marks for the labor market and job security factors. In the “quality of life” category, which includes issues such as public safety, health and transport, Germany ranks in the upper midfield. The bottom line is that 64 percent of expats are satisfied with their life in Germany – this is also a comparatively low value. Globally, 72 percent of respondents say they are satisfied with their life in the host country.
In the overall ranking of all categories, only four of the 53 countries perform worse than Germany: South Korea, Turkey, Norway and Kuwait at the bottom. The most popular country for expats is Mexico, followed by Spain, Panama, Malaysia and Taiwan. Thailand, Costa Rica, the Philippines, Bahrain and Portugal complete the top ten of the Expat Insider study.
The Expat Insider Study has been conducted annually by InterNations since 2014. With more than 4.8 million members in 420 cities, the Munich organization claims to be the world’s largest community for expats. In the previous year’s study, Germany was ranked 42nd out of 52.
The federal government recently passed a law on the immigration of skilled workers through parliament, which is intended to lower the hurdles for foreign workers. However, the obstacles are not only of a formal nature, as the Expat Insider study shows. Especially in the social aspects of a welcoming culture – friendliness and openness – Germany has done poorly for years.
