The Federal Statistical Office reports that 281,000 Germans left the country in 2016. Nonetheless the total population increased by 500,000 due to migration, Die Welt reports.
A little more than half (51%) of the migrants that came to Germany are from within the EU and about a third came from the Middle East, Africa and Asia. Mostly regions with much higher birth rates than any EU country as several statistics already show.
About 23% of the total population of 82 million Germans now have a migrant background according to a census of 2016. In comparison only one tenth of pensioners have a migrant background compared to 38% of children. In Western Germany this number is even higher at 42% for children.
The replacement of Germans by migrants is near record high. The increasing number of Germans leaving the country is countered by a higher fertility rate of non-European migrants and a surge in migration.
In 2015 Germany admitted 2,016,000 migrants, a record since the founding of Germany. In 2016, 1,720,000 migrants were admitted, which means a surplus of 635,000 migrants that stayed in the country, instead of leaving it.
Some Germans actually do return to their homeland. In 2016, 146.000 Germans returned, while 281,000 left the country. The most popular destinations are Switzerland (17,650), USA (12,781), Austria (10,283), Great Britain (8,243),Turkey (6,230) and France (5,895).
With the high migration increase from areas like the Middle East it becomes increasingly important to vet migrants based on skill. Studies found that two thirds of refugees can’t properly read or write and that only 10% are “academics“.
Bavaria’s Minister of Economic Affairs, Ilse Aigner, stated in 2016:” 90% of the refugees are not qualified to work in Germany”.
Obviously developments like this present a very large problem as qualified and well educated labour employees are leaving and being replaced with underqualified migrants in many cases. It is yet to be seen how Merkel plans to solve this.