Unemployed people in Germany are currently having great difficulty finding a job. Andrea Nahles, head of the Federal Employment Agency (BA, comparable to the UWV in the Netherlands), said this to the news website on Friday. Web.de. “We have an indicator that shows how likely it is that unemployed people will find a job again,” says Nahles. “The value is usually around seven, but is now 5.7 – lower than ever before.”
The unemployment rate in Germany was consistently above 6 percent in 2025. Last August, more than 3.025 million people were without work. An excess of three million unemployed had not occurred since the beginning of 2015. Nahles takes into account that similar negative figures will be achieved again early next year: German companies announce almost every week that they are going to cut their workforce.
In 2023, the German economy shrank by 0.3 percent, and a year later by 0.2 percent. “The German economy is in the biggest crisis in post-war history. The pandemic, the energy crisis and inflation have made Germans poorer on average,” stated Bert Rürup, chief economist of the business newspaper Handelsblattearly this year. Minimal growth is now expected for 2025.
Stiff as a board
Nahles calls the rise of artificial intelligence, quantum computers and electric driving “structural challenges” for the German economy. German automakers, for example, have been facing financial setbacks for a long time and are engaged in fierce competition with Chinese brands that offer cheap electric cars.
Despite the high unemployment, Nahles emphasizes that in the history of the Federal Republic, which was founded in 1949, there have never been so many employees with compulsory social insurance. She also believes that the unemployment rate is “not that serious” by international standards. But “what we don’t like,” says Nahles, is that “the German labor market has been [stijf is] like a plank. There is no momentum.”
When asked about solutions, she says that 26 percent of Germans who register as job seekers because a contract expires do not become unemployed in the first place. The Federal Employment Agency helps them find a new job “immediately,” says Nahles. For example, through a retraining program. That is why the government budget for further training has been increased by 12 percent for next year.
She also encourages young people to move to areas with more jobs. They are then often entitled to a ‘mobility subsidy’, which is currently only rarely applied for. In some parts of Germany there are sufficient employment opportunities, says Nahles, but there is a shortage of affordable housing or childcare places. According to her, these problems need to be addressed.
Nahles was previously politically active with the social democratic party SPD. She was, among other things, Minister of Labor from 2013 to 2017.
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