The government in Berlin is preparing a German version of the green card modeled on Canada, because it has millions of open jobs, and demographics are relentless. Labor from the Western Balkans is viewed particularly favorably.

“We are introducing an opportunity card with a transparent points system so that people needed by our country can come to us more easily,” Labor Minister Hubertus Hail (SPD) told the Sunday edition of the tabloid Bild.

The so-called opportunity card (Chancenkarte) strongly resembles the American or Canadian green card (Green Card). Employers in Germany in particular have long been calling for something like this. Because the country lacks labor. Relentless demographics say that by 2035 there will be seven million fewer people in the labor market—unless immigration increases significantly.

Social Democratic Minister Hail says it is difficult to look for a job in Germany if you are not physically there, so he wants to make arrival itself easier.

As things currently stand, anyone who completed education in Germany—at any level—will automatically receive an opportunity card.

If not, then they must meet three out of four criteria: education (qualification) from abroad, at least three years of work experience, knowledge of German or previous residence in Germany, and being younger than 35.

“We need immigration,” said Hail. “Year after year, in line with needs, we would determine a quota for how many people can receive an opportunity card so they can look for a job or internship for a certain period of time. During that period, they will have to support themselves financially.”

The opportunity card should also make arrival in Germany itself easier, even without a job—in order to look for one there.

Although the matter has not yet been agreed upon in Chancellor Olaf Scholz's government, there is no doubt that it will be this autumn. Because all three coalition partners—the Social Democrats, Greens, and Liberals—support making immigration easier.

Looking toward the Balkans

The relatively new German immigration law allows anyone who finds an employer to work—provided they are qualified for something. They can be accountants or drivers; what matters is having some kind of certificate.

An exception is the so-called “Western Balkans rule,” adopted at the height of the refugee crisis when migrants from Syria and the Far East were being joined en masse by asylum seekers from Serbia, Macedonia, or Kosovo.

It was then agreed that 25,000 people annually from the countries of the Western Balkans could obtain work permits in Germany, even when it comes to unskilled workers.

But this summer it turned out that even that was not enough. “In the countries of the Western Balkans there is plenty of labor that would work in hotels and restaurants in Germany,” cried Guido Celik, head of the hospitality and hotel association Dehoga.

That sector, after a rapid recovery following the lockdown era, suddenly lacked a lot of labor. Something similar happened with airports and airlines that had laid people off during lockdown. That is why this summer in Germany was chaotic for many who wanted to fly off on vacation.

Admittedly, the question is how many people are still ready to emigrate from the drained Western Balkans. They felt this well this year in Croatian tourism, where waiters and chambermaids, instead of coming from Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, are increasingly arriving from Nepal and the Philippines.

Immigration against cataclysm

“Never before in Germany have there been so many vacant jobs as today,” the magazine Spiegel recently wrote in its cover story. “Staff shortages are choking airports, restaurants, or swimming pools—and yet that is only a trifle compared to what threatens the country.”

Statistics show that 1.74 million jobs are vacant, although in reality there are probably many more.

Thus, a job in elderly care remains vacant for an average of 239 days—meaning employers can hardly find a caregiver for almost eight months. It is barely better for sheet metal workers, heating technicians, and air-conditioning installers, where a new employee is awaited for 224 days. In building construction, a worker is sought for 221 days on average, and for nurses, midwives, and paramedics the average is 188 days.

All this could lead to a horror scenario for the German economy in which by 2060 there would be only 1.7 workers for every pensioner. Even today that ratio is not great (2.7), which leads to relatively low pensions.

To avoid this, experts estimate that Germany needs 400,000 immigrants every year.

That is why, the ruling coalition says, a paradigm shift is needed—that is, for Germany to finally declare itself an “immigration country” like Canada. The Christian Democratic Union resisted this for decades, including during Angela Merkel's four chancellor terms.

How much change this requires is nicely illustrated by one of the Liberals' proposals: they are asking for English to be introduced as a second language in German institutions that work with citizens. Thus it could happen that, while gastarbajteri learn German, German officials learn English.

Source: dw.com