There's a German business story out there this morning, from the Focus business news (news magazine).....detailing this political agenda being talked about with the CDU Party.
The new strategy quietly discussed by the party? The idea to push people under the age of fifty who are on social welfare (Hartz IV) out, and lead them to employment. (Hint: push is a good word in this case).
Why? Well....just about everyone in the business community will admit now that the trend for skilled workers is downward, and expected to continue that direction. The idea is that if you are between 18 and 50....sitting at home and whining about Hartz IV is not helping the business community.
One aspect of this long-term unemployed deal is that so many of these people don't have a certificate or real skill area.
They aren't clear on how you'd 'force' a guy to go....apply....and accept work, period. The carrot here on the stick appears that you just wouldn't get any welfare pay, but I don't know how you'd pass that via the Bundestag (the SPD folks, and the Linke Party would stand against it).
Yeah, it would become some sort of conditional basic universal income deal in a way.....where you get paid, for work. One can be amused over the condition required, but it fits.
For several years, I've sat and looked at how Hartz IV (welfare) works in Germany and been amazed at the nature of long-term unemployed. Generally, you have three groups of people. You have the first group of people who are terminated from a job and have a full-year of unemployment. Maybe the company downsized....maybe the gal was always late for work....maybe it was a bad-attitude with customers....maybe they just would not take orders. So the government has a fund to cover this one-year group of unemployed. They aren't on welfare, at least at this point.
The second group is usually the older guy, who has two years of unemployment compensation. If over the age of fifty....this group has more issues in getting work, and may have more of a label of unable to accept change.
Then the third group exists....those from group one and two, who are long-term unemployed. Back around 2005/2006, there might have been five to six percent of the German work-force considered long-term unemployed. Today, if you use Tradingeconomics.com's data......it's near 1.5 percent of the work force.
The bothersome part of this deal is that you have more and more young people who get tossed out the door....in their early 20's and don't get aggressive to find work, or accept work.
The other trend which gets talked about by German business analysts is that the unemployment is different from state to state in Germany (16 states). In the northwest, it's hefty. In Bavaria, it's near 2.5-percent in a number of cities. They (the Bavarians) are literally begging for workers.
A program to move people from a high-unemployment area to a low-unemployment area? It doesn't exist. You would think that some HR-like folks would be working for the government....find fifty long-term unemployed folks in some community with real potential, and toss 5,000 Euro at moving them (their family included) down to Bavaria, and get them set up with an apartment and a job. But no....no such program exists.
As for the CDU idea of pushing people into work? I'll sit back and watch this develop but I have zero confidence that the other parties in the Bundestag will go along with something like this. They'd prefer some kind of universal income deal.....where work of value....isn't the productive reason to get the income.
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