If you only look at the most important key figures, it seems as if the worst period of this crisis has been overcome. For the labor market, an overview paper prepared by the Bavarian Regional Directorate of the Federal Employment Agency lists several positive values. According to this, the highest level of unemployment since the outbreak of the pandemic was reached in January. 316,791 people were unemployed at the time – almost 67,000 more than in January 2020. Since then, the number of unemployed has fallen continuously. The companies are also looking a little more optimistically into the future, the demand for new employees is increasing in almost all industries. There are currently just under 116,000 vacancies registered in Bavaria, which is roughly the same as in June 2017. And compared to 2020, a forecast for the annual average assumes a slight increase in employment of 32,400 people.
Nevertheless, looking at the labor market is not without worry. “We must not forget that the structural change already slowed employment growth before the Corona crisis,” says Ralf Holtzwart, head of the regional directorate. But in times of crisis “people who already have a harder time finding a job have it a little harder”. This is another reason why long-term unemployment is rising in Bavaria – completely contrary to the other trend on the labor market. In June, 75,162 people were registered as long-term unemployed. That was 24,389 more than last year and even 31,802 more than in June 2019.
That was hardly an issue so far. The effects of the pandemic have masked so much. The old challenges are slowly coming to the fore again on the labor market. And they haven’t gotten any smaller. In order to reduce unemployment in the future, the job centers continue to rely on qualification and further training. “Almost half of the unemployed have no completed vocational training, the proportion is even higher among the long-term unemployed,” says Holtzwart. However, the companies were primarily looking for skilled workers or academics. In the area of long-term unemployment, the regional directorate is hoping for the Participation Opportunities Act. The instrument had an impact before the crisis and provides, among other things, to reimburse employers for wage costs if they give the long-term unemployed a chance.
The topic of recruiting young talent also remains a long-running issue. 1.6 million employees in Bavaria are more than 55 years old and will soon be retiring. However, due to demographics, the number of those who could follow them into the profession is decreasing. For years, trade, industry and trade in particular have been complaining about falling numbers of applicants. Most recently, the job centers ran around 40,000 vacant training positions – while 20,824 young people had not yet found an apprenticeship. Economy Minister Hubert Aiwanger (FW) therefore once again promoted vocational training last week: “Secure your dream job now. It’s not too late for the training to start in autumn.” The trend, however, continues towards universities and universities of applied sciences. Almost a third of the under 35-year-olds in Bavaria have an academic degree – in contrast, the figure for people over 55 years of age is only 14 percent. At 55 percent, the proportion of young academics in IT and scientific service professions is particularly high, according to the regional directorate’s paper: a “good development” in view of digitization and the like.