This summer, the weather on the German labor market is improving rapidly
According to a survey of 600 executives of large and medium-sized companies conducted by the Munich Institute for Economic Research (IfO) on behalf of the business weekly Wirtschaftswoche, 24% of these enterprises have vacant jobs, and layoffs are expected in only 11% of German companies.
Mostly, medium-sized enterprises with 500 to 1,000 employees are preparing to recruit staff. At the same time, 40% of German firms plan to increase output from already hired staff, and 38% plan to assign more work duties to existing employees before hiring new ones.
The first thing that prevents German firms from hiring more actively is the still unstable situation with new orders for the current and next year, which almost half of the IfO surveyed executives complained about. 44% are dissatisfied with the quality of the material offered by the German labor market: complaints about insufficient qualifications of potential employees have long been traditional for HR specialists.
One third of German company directors believe that hiring new people is hindered by the country's dismissal protection system, which grants significant rights to employees hired for an indefinite term; a quarter blame high wage costs for the lack of new jobs. Finally, one in five German enterprises could not find a suitable candidate for the jobs offered over the past year and a half. The crisis year 2009, in turn, prompted many of those who did not find a place in the traditional labor market to register their own businesses.
For the first time in six years, the number of newly created firms in Germany has grown: last year, 872,000 residents of the Federal Republic became private entrepreneurs (77,000 more than the previous year), and the country registered 10% more new companies.
However, experts give not the most favorable survival forecasts for new market participants. For example, according to statistics from the state bank KfW (Kreditanstalt fr Wiederaufbau), which issues the lion's share of loans to start-up entrepreneurs, a quarter of newly registered companies cease operations within three years of founding.
The state bank's experts believe that the larger the capital with which a company starts market activities, the higher its chances of success. In 2009, most novice entrepreneurs risked not only their own money: 70% of all newly created companies attracted borrowed funds.
Maxim Smirnov.
Russkaya Germaniya