With the approaching retirement of the large Baby Boomer cohorts, the German labor market faces a significant gap. In the next 15 years, the labor market will lose nearly one-third of today’s workforce, the Federal Statistical Office (Statistisches Bundesamt) reported on Wednesday. By 2039, around 13.4 million workers will have passed the statutory retirement age of 67. “Younger age groups will not be able to replace the Baby Boomers numerically,” the office added.
Baby Boomers are defined as those born roughly from the mid-1950s to the late 1960s, a period of above-average birth rates in Germany. According to the Federal Statistical Office, 15.3 million children were born between 1957 and 1968. The largest single cohort was in 1964, with 1.36 million births. Of these, about 12.0 million were born in West Germany and 3.4 million in East Germany.
Based on the most recent microcensus, statisticians in Wiesbaden reported that 60- to 64-year-olds in 2024, although already transitioning to retirement, still accounted for 4.4 million workers. Younger Baby Boomers aged 55 to 59 numbered 5.6 million, making them the largest working-age group across all ages. Together, these two groups accounted for 10.0 million workers, more than any younger age group up to 54 years. Thus, the 45- to 54-year-olds, with 9.3 million employed persons, and the 35- to 44-year-olds, with 9.8 million, do not come close to the number of the baby boomers, and the 25- to 34-year-olds, with 9.0 million, are also significantly lower.
This looming demographic shift is particularly striking when viewed in the context of Germany’s population development since reunification. As Germany celebrates 35 years of unity in 2025, its population has grown by just 3.8 million people (+5%) since 1990, from 79.8 million to 83.6 million by the end of 2024. The slow pace of overall population growth underscores the challenge: while the country gained 3.8 million people over 35 years, it stands to lose 13.4 million workers in just the next 15 years.
Against the backdrop of debates about keeping the baby boomer generation more extensively in the workforce or possibly reactivating them from retirement in order to at least mitigate future labor shortages in the short term, the statisticians also pointed out that the employment rate of older people has already increased in the past ten years: While in 2014 just under two-thirds (65 percent) of 55- to 64-year-olds were employed, by 2024 this figure had already risen to three-quarters (75 percent) - an increase of ten percentage points.
Despite this development, however, many baby boomers continue to retire early, as the Federal Office further explained: "The reasons for this are diverse and range from health restrictions to special insurance-related issues such as long-term premium payments or early retirement offers from companies to the desire for more leisure time."
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