Even though Germany’s four major employers’ bodies, (BDA, BDI, DIHK, and ZDH), have recently lent their support for Angela Merkel’s highly controversial refugee integration policy, the Cologne Institute for Economic Research (IW), also sympathetic towards employers, in a study published on 29 February, drew the clear conclusion that these refugees are lacking the skills and language to adequately compensate for the country’s growing need for skilled labor. The lack of skilled manpower is an empirical fact threatening the country’s competitiveness and prosperity. To meet this challenge, and in spite of the current influx of refugees, the IW argues that Germany needs a “managed migration policy” catering for skilled workers from abroad. The institute is specifically calling on the government to implement a “points system” along the lines of what is already in place in Canada and Australia.
Disillusioned. Since September 2015, when the first massive waves of refugees started to flow into Germany certain political and economic leaders had stressed the ‘positives’ these refugees would be bringing to the country. Andrea Nahles, Minister for Employment and Social Affairs, stated that the refugees could be “a blessing for the German labor market.” Dieter Zetsche, head of Daimler stated, “Most of the refugees are young, qualified, and highly motivated,” (c.f. article No. 9238). Six mont
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