East more affected: every eighth employee is overqualified

You have studied or completed an apprenticeship, but earn your living as a mini jobber: More than four million employees in Germany work for which they are formally overqualified. That affects the individual, but it may also weaken the entire German economy.

Around every eighth employee who is subject to social security contributions in Germany has a job below their actual training level. This emerges from a response from the Federal Employment Agency to a request from the left in the Bundestag. At the end of last year, a total of 4.05 million employees subject to social security contributions were doing an activity with a level of difficulty below their qualification. That was twelve percent of the 33.74 million employees subject to social security contributions. One in five of the mini jobbers was formally overqualified: 911,000 of them worked below their qualification level.

On the one hand, people were counted who had a vocational qualification but only worked as a helper, i.e. simple routine work. That was around 2.57 million people at the end of 2019. In addition, there were 1.48 million with an academic degree who worked as helpers or specialists, i.e. who would not have formally required their technical college or university degree for their work. Women in eastern Germany are disproportionately affected. Compared to their male colleagues, they more often have a higher formal qualification than necessary. The same applies to all employees in East Germany compared to employees living in West Germany.

At the same time, the chairman of the Federal Employment Agency (BA), Detlef Scheele, warns of a worsening shortage of skilled workers and also sees politics as an obligation. "The immigration of skilled workers to Germany is too low and continues to decline," Scheele told the newspapers of the Funke media group. "We urgently need to train our own workforce. That fell behind during the crisis. The gap between job growth and potential workforce is widening."

Scheele called for a simplification of the "Work of Tomorrow Law" from SPD Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil, which regulates the promotion of professional training in the face of structural change. "There are 13 different funding options," said the BA boss. "This is very difficult to do and should at least be made easier for the time of the pandemic." A functional immigration law for skilled workers is also necessary. The hurdles for the immigration of skilled workers are "very high". It is about the full recognition of professional qualifications from abroad and job promises in Germany.

"Mini jobs destroy qualifications"

At the same time, however, around one in eight employees has a job for which their formal qualifications are actually insufficient. At the end of last year, 2.87 million people without a vocational qualification were employed as skilled workers, experts or specialists. Such jobs usually require two to three years of vocational training, a master's degree or even a technical college or university degree. In addition, there are 1.14 million who have a non-academic degree but would normally need a university degree for their work.

But what about all those who are employed below their formal qualifications? "Working with qualifications harms the job satisfaction of those affected and reduces their income," said the left-wing MP Sabine Zimmermann, who had made the request in the Bundestag. In fact, according to the data from the Federal Employment Agency, the average wage of skilled workers is 806 euros higher than the average wage of the helpers. "The pandemic-related economic crisis and the ongoing economic transformation are exacerbating the situation again because hundreds of thousands of people have lost their jobs and more will lose their jobs," said Zimmermann. In addition, skilled workers would be bound who would be desperately wanted elsewhere.

The federal government accused Zimmermann of relying on work at any price for around 15 years, i.e. since the Hartz reforms took effect. In this way, the labor market potential has been destroyed on a large scale. This particularly applies to marginal employment: "Mini-jobs destroy qualifications to an above-average extent, especially among women." The politician called for sanctions against the unemployed to be abolished and for them to be better supported in their search for jobs that meet their qualifications. Mini jobs would have to be converted into employment subject to social security contributions.

But there are also rays of hope in the Corona crisis: BA boss Scheele is quite optimistic about the situation on the training market. "My expectation is that we'll end up with slightly more unserved people than we did before the pandemic," he said. "We don't see a Corona vintage". In total, there are a good 513,000 training positions for around 460,000 applicants. 100,000 of them are still not supplied. "That means we are six to eight weeks behind the normal training schedule. We agree with the chambers that we want to place additional placements by January."