The Federal Employment Agency reported that migrants have contributed considerably to safeguarding employment levels in Germany. The increase in employment between June 2014 and June 2025 was borne primarily by foreign national workers.
The agency stated in Nuremberg that people from third countries accounted for 43 percent of the increase in employment. Around a third of these people came from the eight most prominent countries of origin of asylum seekers.
Without immigration from abroad, Germany’s working population would already have decreased considerably. The number of working-age people holding a German passport declined by some 3.9 million between 2014 and 2024. At the same time the number of people able to work without a German passport rose by 3.4 million.
Daniel Terzenbach, a board member of the Federal Employment Agency, said: “This development is in part due to successful labour market integration. Refugees have contributed considerably to employment growth.” The number of employees contributing to social insurance from the most prominent countries of origin of refugees had more than doubled over the past five years. Syria and Afghanistan are the two most important countries of origin here.