Germany scores highly in integration – experts see great progress

Ten years after the large-scale refugee influx, migration expert Herbert Brücker from the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) draws a positive conclusion . He believes that Germany has achieved remarkable success in integrating migrants compared to other European countries. " Together with Norway, we are quite far ahead – and significantly better than Denmark, the Netherlands, and Italy ," Brücker said in an interview with Handelsblatt . However, he added that distributing refugees to structurally weak regions with high unemployment was a mistake. Nevertheless, the overall trend shows that the labor market has developed positively for many of the refugees who fled in 2015.

Employment above average

Particularly striking is that among the men who fled to Germany in 2015, the employment rate is now even higher than the German average . A clear majority now supports themselves , and more than half work as skilled workers or in higher-skilled positions. Brücker emphasizes that the actual qualification level of many refugees is significantly higher than their lack of formal qualifications would suggest. Often, the work experience in their home countries corresponds to the requirements of the German labor market. For example, someone in retail in Syria or Iraq has taken on similar tasks to those in this country – even if their formal training path was different.

“We can do it” – a review after ten years

When Chancellor Angela Merkel coined the phrase "We can do it" in August 2015, more than a million people sought refuge in Germany within a short period of time. Today, it is clear that integration into work and society has been successful in many places. This sets Germany as a positive example in Europe—a signal for the future of migration and integration policy.