But the demand for qualified workers is growing even faster than the supply.
(Photo: imago images/Shotshop)
Berlin The Saarland University and State Library is looking for a department head for IT services, Daimler needs data scientists for machine learning and app developer Finanzguru wants to hire UI designers to help develop interactive products. IT specialists are in demand – in the public sector as well as in classic industry or with start-ups.
But they are a rare commodity, as a new analysis by the competence center for securing skilled workers (Kofa), which is based at the German Economic Institute (IW), shows. The study is available to the Handelsblatt.
According to this, around 28,700 vacancies were counted in October 2021 in IT professions for which there were no suitably qualified unemployed nationwide. This corresponds to around 53 percent of all vacancies. According to the analysis, the gap in skilled workers in IT professions is higher than ever before
On average over the year, around 854,000 people worked in IT professions in 2020 – 41 percent more than in 2013. Relative growth was only even stronger for professions in languages, literature, humanities, social sciences and economics, at just under 56 percent.
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However, the supply of labor has not kept pace with the growing demand. Between July 2018 and June 2019, the shortage of skilled workers in the IT professions peaked at almost 26,000 jobs before the economic downturn and the corona crisis caused them to shrink temporarily.
In the moving annual average from July 2020 to June 2021, it was around 13,900 again at around the level of 2016, although it expanded to the new record level by October. IT experts are particularly scarce. Almost 82 percent of the vacancies in this area cannot be filled.
More on the labor shortage
The situation is similar in business informatics, and software developers are also in high demand. Academics are almost always wanted.
Based on a projection of the jobs reported to the Federal Employment Agency (BA), Kofa assumes that there were almost 53,800 vacancies in IT professions in October 2021. At the beginning of the year, the industry association Bitkom even stated that there were 96,000 vacancies for IT specialists.
In its “Future of Job” report published at the beginning of the year, the Boston Consulting Group expects that Germany will lack around 1.1 million IT specialists by 2030. New digital business models, the digitization of administration or the increased use of home offices mean that the need for workers in IT professions is growing.
Immigration of skilled workers severely slowed down
So far, immigration has also helped to cover it – even if the proportion of foreigners among IT specialists at 11.5 percent is only slightly above the average for all qualified professions (9.7 percent). The Skilled Immigration Act, which came into force about two years ago, provides that IT experts can also receive a residence permit without formal qualifications, provided they can prove a concrete job offer and practical experience. This regulation only applies to the IT sector.
>> Read here: The Handelsblatt reported extensively on the BCG study. Read the most important results of the “Future of Jobs” report here.
However, immigration to Germany slowed down sharply when the corona pandemic began. According to the Federal Government’s most recent migration report, only 174 IT specialists entered the country in 2020 on the basis of the above-mentioned statutory exception.
The so-called EU Blue Card for the entry of highly qualified academics from countries outside the EU was only issued around 7,300 times in Germany in the first year of Corona – only half as often as in 2019. The prerequisite is a gross annual salary of at least 56,400 euros. In shortage occupations, which include not only doctors, engineers, natural scientists or mathematicians but also IT specialists, the salary threshold is just under 44,000 euros.
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