Germany is in a structural disaster—with falling exports, hovering power costs, and weakening competitiveness in its most necessary sectors. However in accordance with the bosses of Germany’s greatest companies, the actual downside is its employees taking an excessive amount of sick depart.
A number of German employers have lamented a record-breaking 12 months for absences linked to sickness.
Tens of millions of Germans are calling in sick to work at a fee almost 4 occasions seen within the U.Ok., giving an entire new that means to the nation’s unlucky “Sick Man of Europe” moniker.
Analysis from Techniker Krankenkasse (TK), Germany’s largest medical health insurance fund, confirmed that employees missed a mean of 19.4 days of labor as a result of sickness in 2023, a report excessive.
The nation could possibly be set for an additional report 12 months of absences in 2024 after TK’s 5.7 million insured employees registered 14.3 sick days within the first 9 months of the 12 months, earlier than the infamous festive sickness interval.
Whereas it has largely prevented a technical recession, Germany’s financial system contracted by 0.3% in 2023 and is ready for a 0.2% decline this 12 months.
“Sick Man of Europe“
Staff took 15 days of sick depart in 2022 in Germany. By comparability, U.Ok. employees misplaced 5.7 days to sickness in the identical 12 months
The German Affiliation of Analysis-Based mostly Pharmaceutical Firms (VFA) says that with out the above-average variety of sick days, Germany’s financial system would have expanded by 0.5% in 2023 fairly than declining by 0.3%
In brief, this implies Germany’s excessive fee of illness value its financial system about €26 billion final 12 months, in accordance with VFA.
These findings haven’t been misplaced on Germany’s employers, who don’t sound satisfied that their staff are genuinely in poor health.
One unnamed blue-chip manufacturing government instructed the FT that there was “a complete unwillingness” amongst employees to grasp the sacrifices wanted to assist the nation’s financial system prosper. He singled out “work-shy” youthful staff as a selected downside case.
“And then everyone wonders why Germany is the sick man of Europe,” the exec stated.
German legal guidelines enable employees to take six weeks of illness depart whereas receiving full pay, which has pissed off some employers.
In September, managers at Tesla’s Grünheide manufacturing facility in Germany visited the properties of about 30 staff who had known as in sick, Handelsblatt reported. The carmaker stated employee absence jumped by 5% on Fridays and through late shifts in contrast with different days of the week.
“That is not an indicator of bad working conditions because the working conditions are the same on all working days and across all shifts,” the nation’s manufacturing director, André Thierig, instructed the Guardian. “It suggests that the German social system is being exploited to some extent.”
Albrecht Wehner, an professional in well being administration at TK, stated blaming the nation’s financial issues on a rise in chilly and flu instances is just too short-sighted.
“A cold is sometimes unavoidable and usually only lasts a few days. Long-term diagnoses such as mental illnesses are far more significant. Relatively fewer employees are affected by this. But the number of days off is comparatively high,” Wehner stated.
Germany is going through a myriad of social and financial points that haven’t any simple repair. The financial big’s manufacturing-intensive financial system has proved weak to international shocks and is shedding its aggressive edge amid elevated would possibly from Chinese language business.
These have affected German exports, which account for an outsized share of the nation’s GDP.
Its earlier dependence on Russian oil and fuel has additionally triggered a shock to the nation’s power costs within the wake of sanctions imposed following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, placing additional strain on enter prices.“Everything that could go wrong went wrong, or is going wrong,” Carsten Brzeski, ING’s international head of Macro, beforehand summarized to Fortune.
