The recession in Germany is no longer just an economic headline, it is now hitting the vocational training market hard. According to a new survey by the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DIHK), more than a quarter of companies (26 percent) plan to offer fewer training positions this year.
“The training market is clearly following the labor market,” said DIHK Deputy Managing Director Achim Dercks during the presentation of the survey in Berlin.
The DIHK survey reveals a difficult picture. Many companies are still struggling to find suitable trainees, three out of four companies with vacancies said they had not found qualified candidates in 2024. This shortage continues despite a slight improvement: for the first time since 2012, the number of training companies unable to fill all their positions dropped from 49 percent in 2023 to 48 percent in 2024.
Still, the DIHK warns that “the figures for 2025 also indicate a decline in training positions,” showing that the downward trend is far from over. More than a quarter of companies plan to reduce their apprenticeships by 2025.
For companies, good work and social skills are the most important minimum requirement for prospective trainees. 92 percent of companies consider these skills important or very important. Trainees’ basic mental performance is almost equally important, valued by 86 percent of employers.
However, companies also report worrying gaps among applicants. Almost half identified frequent deficits in both basic mental performance (46 percent) and work and social behavior, especially resilience (56 percent). In contrast, only 11 percent of companies reported frequent deficiencies in teamwork skills.
Interestingly, only 67 percent of companies consider basic school skills important or very important. Still, many report specific academic weaknesses: frequent deficits in German oral and written communication (44 percent), basic math skills (43 percent), science (24 percent), English (20 percent), and economics (36 percent).
When it comes to technical literacy, only around one-third of companies view basic IT and media skills as important. Just 11 percent see frequent deficiencies here, suggesting that technology skills are less of a problem than basic academic or social skills.
More than half of companies (57 percent) see apprentices from third countries as a valuable opportunity to secure their future skilled workforce, this includes both refugees and immigrants who have come to Germany specifically for training. One in three companies has already attempted to train such apprentices, with most reporting success (30 percent successful vs. only 3 percent unsuccessful).
The survey also sheds light on the challenges companies face when training apprentices from third countries. The lack of affordable housing near workplaces is a significant obstacle for about half of these companies. The biggest challenge, however, is the lack of German language skills, cited by 71 percent of employers.
Bureaucracy is another major hurdle: 62 percent struggle with bureaucratic barriers during immigration and hiring, while 24 percent face such obstacles when hiring apprentices after their training. These issues highlight that filling training positions with international candidates requires more than just recruitment, it also demands structural and policy changes.
Despite the economic slowdown, there are still many open opportunities. Federal Labor Minister Bärbel Bas pointed out: “182,000 apprenticeships are still unfilled – at the same time, 140,000 young people are seeking training. Those who provide good training today secure the skilled workers of tomorrow. And those who have good training are better protected against unemployment in the long term.”
Two-thirds of companies continue to employ all their trainees after training, a sign that high‑quality vocational training remains a secure path into the job market.
As the new training year begins on August 1, Jörg Dittrich, President of the German Confederation of Skilled Crafts (ZDH), issued a clear appeal to policymakers: “The skilled crafts sector expects the new federal government to support vocational training not just in rhetoric, but also in concrete political practice.” He stressed that this should include “reliable funding, a sustainable legal framework, and the legal enshrinement of the equivalence of vocational and academic education.”
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