Few would gift you instant job opportunities in the world’s richest and best countries. While Trump talks up anti-immigration and much of EU is beginning to close its gates to the refugees pouring in, where do we see people asking us to come and be a part of the system of opportunity and a future cementing prosperity and security? Google for some hours and nights and you might just stumble across the obvious solution- Germany and its Blue Card policy! With the prestigious Blue Card, not only do you unlock the German dream with its famous Bienenstrich bread, the classy automobile giants of Porsche and Volkswagen and the 2 million costume Karneval ; in a matter of 18 months, you also hold the keys to your Euro-dream and possess unrestricted access to any of Europe’s corners to wherever you may offer your skill.
Introduced in 2012 by the German government, the German Blue card merits and rewards the skilled software engineers and IT workers with residence in Germany conditional to only one thing- their skills and efforts to their work. IT workers are classified under the shortage-occupations category of the national German employment laws as Germany struggles to meet the supply of such workers faced with growing demand. A further minor condition to the Blue Card is that it is given to those employees in the shortage occupation category with a minimum salary of €3302 per month (€39840 annual excluding any compensation benefits). This minor condition doesn’t prove an issue when the median salary for individuals’ holdings masters degrees in fields of computer science and data science/ big data science is €47,279 on an annual basis. With the blue card in hand, prospects of longer more permanent residence and more free European-work related access broadens.
Complementing your blue card pursuit is Germany’s own desire to have you in its luxurious metropolitans of Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich and Hamburg amongst others. Adding to Germany’s need, is the real shortage of IT/software specialists. Research from German digital association Bitkom shows that almost 60% of the German companies surveyed are short of IT specialists, and demand is greatest for software developers. Furthermore, Almost 64% of the IT companies surveyed have vacancies for software developers, and 27% of end-user companies are looking for similarly-skilled staff. Recent developments have shown that German authorities are actually training refugees to learn and adopt skills of IT/ software to meet this demand. In Germany, tech spending is forecast to grow by 5% and the government is spending $500 million to develop ‘Industry 4.0’- meant to digitalize and bring processes to the internet for Germany’s manufacturing sector. Germany’s search for skilled IT/ software specialist is further augmented by problems of under-population, low fertility and low immigration. According to World Economic Forum reports, at the beginning of this century, forecasts that were considered reliable predicted that Germany would lose more than ten million inhabitants by 2050, owing to declining immigration and a low average birth rate.
With conditions prevalent such as this, it should prove a no-brainer that heading Germany for prospective IT/ software employees is mutually beneficial and a prospect that carries much hope and a fairly bright future. Contrary to issues of European jobs being crowding out, here the Germans seem welcoming of immigrants and individuals with special selected talents and technical expertise. Many of the world’s biggest software houses and IT firms namely SoundCloud, Facebook, Google, SAP and Zolando have their offices in Berlin and the many lucky may even land dream jobs here. So just as the grand German motorways have no speed limits, your push for success shall meet no end.