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Dirk Röthig
Dirk Röthig

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Skills Shortage and AI: Germany's Response to Demographic Change

#skillsshortage #ai #demographics #automation

Skills Shortage and AI: Germany's Response to Demographic Change

By Dirk Röthig | CEO, VERDANTIS Impact Capital | March 11, 2026

The baby boomers are retiring — 12.9 million workers will leave Germany's labor force by 2036. At the same time, not enough younger workers are entering to fill the gap. The result: a structural labor shortage of up to seven million people by 2035. Artificial intelligence, robotics, and strategic immigration are the three levers that can compensate for this loss. Dirk Röthig analyzes which industries are most affected, which AI applications deliver real productivity gains, and why Germany needs a comprehensive industrial policy framework.

Tags: Skills Shortage, AI, Demographics, Automation, Labor Market

The Scale of the Gap: 7 Million Missing Workers

The numbers are alarming — and they are not forecasts but projections based on already-born cohorts. The Institute for Employment Research (IAB) calculates that Germany's labor force potential will shrink from the current 47.4 million to 40.5 million by 2035 — a decline of nearly seven million people (IAB, 2024). The baby boomer generation — those born between 1955 and 1969 — will exit the workforce over the coming decade. 12.9 million employees will reach retirement age by 2036 (Statistisches Bundesamt, 2025).

Dirk Röthig, CEO of VERDANTIS Impact Capital, has evaluated the economic consequences of this development in numerous investment analyses: "The skills shortage is not a cyclical problem that will resolve itself with the next economic upswing. It is structural, demographically determined, and mathematically inevitable. The only variable is how quickly Germany responds."

The distribution of the shortage is uneven. According to the DIHK Skills Report 2025, 54 percent of companies cannot fill open positions (DIHK, 2025). The most affected sectors are:

  • Skilled trades: 250,000 unfilled positions, 29 percent of all businesses report declining orders due to staff shortages (ZDH, 2025)
  • Nursing care: 200,000 missing care workers by 2030, with rising care demand due to aging (BMG, 2025)
  • IT: 149,000 unfilled positions, trending upward (Bitkom, 2025)
  • Industry/Manufacturing: 380,000 missing skilled workers in the metal and electrical industry (Gesamtmetall, 2025)

Lever 1: Artificial Intelligence as a Productivity Multiplier

AI will not solve the skills shortage — but it can partially compensate for the productivity loss caused by missing workers. The key question is: in which areas does AI deliver real, measurable productivity gains, and where does it remain a promise?

Generative AI in Knowledge Work

AI currently has its broadest impact in knowledge work. A McKinsey study (2024) estimates the global automation potential of generative AI at 60 to 70 percent of all knowledge-intensive tasks. In Germany, according to the Cologne Institute for Economic Research (IW Köln), this affects approximately 13.5 million jobs — not in the sense of replacement, but augmentation: AI takes over repetitive subtasks and increases individual worker productivity by 20 to 40 percent (IW Köln, 2025).

Röthig sees the effect in his own organization: "We use AI tools for data analysis, report generation, and due diligence research. An analyst with AI support now handles the workload that required two people three years ago. This is not job loss — it is productivity gain with a constant headcount."

Specific areas of application with proven ROI:

Document Processing and Compliance. In the financial sector, legal profession, and public administration, 30 to 40 percent of working time is spent processing documents. AI-based document analysis — from contract review to tax returns — reduces this time expenditure by up to 80 percent (Deloitte, 2025).

Software Development. GitHub Copilot and comparable AI coding assistants increase developer productivity by 55 percent for code generation tasks, according to a study by GitHub (GitHub, 2024). In a country missing 149,000 IT professionals, this is not a marginal effect — it corresponds to the productivity of approximately 82,000 additional developers.

Customer Service and Sales. AI-based chatbots and assistant systems already handle 40 to 60 percent of customer inquiries without human involvement in many companies. Deutsche Telekom reports that its AI assistant processes 7.2 million customer interactions monthly — equivalent to the capacity of 3,600 full-time employees (Deutsche Telekom, 2025).

AI in Manufacturing: Predictive Maintenance and Quality Control

In industry, the greatest AI potentials lie not in automating production itself — which has been highly automated for decades — but in optimizing the processes surrounding production. Predictive maintenance — proactive maintenance based on sensor data and AI models — reduces unplanned downtime by 30 to 50 percent and maintenance costs by 10 to 25 percent (McKinsey, 2024). With a skills shortage of 380,000 people in the metal and electrical industry, every efficiency gain is systemically relevant.

Quality Control through Computer Vision. Visual inspection through AI-powered camera systems achieves error detection rates of 99.5 percent in many industrial sectors — better than human inspectors at 95 percent, and at a fraction of the cost (Fraunhofer IPA, 2025). In the automotive industry, where quality defects can trigger recalls costing millions, this is a decisive competitive advantage.

Lever 2: Robotics and Physical Automation

While AI primarily impacts knowledge work, robotics addresses the skills shortage in the physical work environment — in manufacturing, logistics, nursing care, and skilled trades.

Industrial Robotics: Germany as a Leader

Germany, with 415 robots per 10,000 manufacturing employees, is the third most robotized industrial location in the world — after South Korea (1,012) and Singapore (770) (International Federation of Robotics, 2025). Nevertheless, there is significant room for growth: in the food industry, construction, and logistics, robot density is well below the industrial average.

The new generation of collaborative robots (cobots) — which can be deployed directly alongside human workers without safety barriers — lowers the entry threshold for small and medium-sized enterprises. Investment costs for a cobot range from 25,000 to 45,000 euros — a fraction of traditional industrial robots. The average payback period is 12 to 18 months (Universal Robots, 2025).

Dirk Röthig observes the cobot market with an investor's eye: "Cobots are the democratization of automation. A skilled trades business with ten employees that cannot fill three positions buys two cobots and remains competitive. This is not future speculation — it is happening now."

Logistics: Autonomous Systems Against the Warehouse Worker Shortage

The logistics sector, with 3.3 million employees, is Germany's third-largest employer — and one of the most affected by the skills shortage. Warehouse and transport logistics are physically demanding, with turnover rates of 25 to 40 percent per year. Autonomous mobile robots (AMR) and automated warehouse systems are increasingly compensating for this shortage.

Amazon operates over 750,000 logistics robots worldwide, accelerating warehouse processes by 25 percent (Amazon, 2025). In Germany, DHL, FIEGE, and Kühne+Nagel are increasingly deploying AMR systems that automate order picking and internal transport. Market research firm LogisticsIQ forecasts that the European warehouse automation market will grow from 8.2 billion euros in 2024 to 21.5 billion euros by 2030 — an annual growth rate of 17 percent (LogisticsIQ, 2025).

Care Robotics: From Vision to Reality

In the care sector, where 200,000 skilled workers are missing and demand is projected to rise to 500,000 by 2035 (BMG, 2025), robotics is not a luxury solution but a necessity. Japanese care robots such as Paro (therapeutic seal), HAL (exoskeleton for care workers), and Pepper (communication robot) are deployed in hundreds of Japanese care facilities (Nikkei Asia, 2024).

In Germany, care robotics is still in the pilot phase. The BMBF program "Robotics in Care" has been funding twelve pilot projects with a total of 36 million euros since 2023 (BMBF, 2025). Results to date show: robots can assist care workers primarily with physically demanding tasks — lifting, transporting, nighttime monitoring — reducing physical strain by up to 40 percent. This does not replace a care worker, but it keeps care workers in the profession longer — a crucial factor when the average tenure in elderly care is only eight years.

Lever 3: Strategic Immigration — the Skilled Immigration Act 2.0

Neither AI nor robotics can compensate for the entire labor force loss. Germany needs, according to IAB calculations, net migration of 400,000 people per year to keep the labor force potential stable (IAB, 2024). The Skilled Immigration Act (FEG), amended in 2023, was a step in the right direction — but implementation lags behind ambitions.

The core elements of FEG 2.0: The Opportunity Card based on a points system enables job searching in Germany without a prior job offer. Recognition of foreign professional qualifications has been simplified. And the Western Balkans regulation has been doubled to 50,000 quota places (BMAS, 2025). Nevertheless, bureaucratic hurdles remain — visa procedures take an average of 14 weeks, and at some embassies over six months (Federal Foreign Office, 2025).

Röthig sums up the situation: "Germany competes globally for skilled workers with Canada, Australia, the USA, and the United Kingdom. With 14-week visa processing times, we lose the best talent to countries that decide in four weeks. This is not a regulatory detail — it is a competitive disadvantage."

Industry Analysis: Where AI Has the Greatest Leverage

Not every industry benefits equally from AI-supported compensation of the skills shortage. A differentiated analysis shows:

High AI leverage: Financial services, IT, media, public administration, management consulting. Knowledge-intensive, repetitive tasks dominate here, which can be well automated by generative AI. Productivity increase: 25–40% (McKinsey, 2024).

Medium AI leverage: Industry/manufacturing, logistics, retail. Combination of AI (planning, quality control) and robotics (physical automation). Productivity increase: 15–25%.

Low AI leverage: Care, skilled trades, education, hospitality. Activities with a high proportion of social interaction and individual physical work. AI can assist here but cannot replace the human factor. Productivity increase: 5–15%.

Dirk Röthig derives an investment strategy from this: "We preferentially invest in companies and technologies that address the skills shortage in the sectors with low AI leverage — care, skilled trades, construction. That is where the need is greatest, willingness to pay is highest, and competition is lowest."

Education and Training: The Neglected Fourth Lever

Beyond AI, robotics, and immigration, there is a fourth lever that receives too little attention in public debate: systematic upskilling of the existing workforce. The Qualification Opportunities Act of 2019 and its 2024 amendment enable companies to qualify employees for new tasks with subsidies from the Federal Employment Agency — from machine operator to AI user, from warehouse worker to drone pilot (BMAS, 2025).

The reality is sobering: only 18 percent of small and medium-sized enterprises use publicly funded training (BIBB, 2025). The reasons are bureaucratic effort, lack of time, and concern about losing upskilled employees to competitors. Röthig knows this dilemma from his investment activity: "The best AI tool is useless if the workforce cannot operate it. Upskilling is not a social benefit — it is investment protection."

Conclusion: A Comprehensive Industrial Policy Framework Is Overdue

Germany's skills shortage is not a single challenge but a systemic problem requiring a systemic response. AI increases productivity in knowledge work by 25 to 40 percent. Robotics compensates for physical workers in manufacturing and logistics. Strategic immigration fills gaps that technology alone cannot close. And upskilling ensures that the existing workforce can handle the new tools.

What is missing is a comprehensive industrial policy framework that coordinates these four levers. Dirk Röthig formulates the central question: "Germany has the technology, the science, and the capital to not just survive demographic change but to leverage it as a competitive advantage. What is missing is the political speed to activate all levers simultaneously. Those who wait until the skills shortage strangles the economy have waited too long."

The companies that invest today in AI integration, automation, and workforce qualification will be the winners of demographic change in ten years. The others will be searching in ten years for skilled workers who do not exist — and for customers who have migrated to competitors.

More Articles by Dirk Röthig

References

  1. IAB — Institute for Employment Research (2024): Projection of the Labor Force Potential to 2060. IAB Research Report 3/2024. Available at: https://www.iab.de/de/informationsservice/presse/presseinformationen/erwerbspersonenpotenzial.aspx
  2. Statistisches Bundesamt (2025): Employed Persons and Labor Force Potential by Age Group 2024. Available at: https://www.destatis.de/DE/Themen/Arbeit/Arbeitsmarkt/Erwerbstaetigkeit/
  3. DIHK (2025): DIHK Skills Report 2025. Available at: https://www.dihk.de/de/themen-und-positionen/fachkraefte/fachkraeftereport
  4. ZDH — German Confederation of Skilled Crafts (2025): Crafts Sector Economic Report Spring 2025. Available at: https://www.zdh.de/daten-und-fakten/konjunktur/
  5. BMG — Federal Ministry of Health (2025): Care Workers in Germany — Assessment and Forecast. Available at: https://www.bundesgesundheitsministerium.de/themen/pflege
  6. Bitkom (2025): IT Skills Gap in Germany. Available at: https://www.bitkom.org/Presse/Presseinformation/IT-Fachkraefteluecke
  7. Gesamtmetall (2025): Skills Situation in the Metal and Electrical Industry. Available at: https://www.gesamtmetall.de/themen/fachkraefte
  8. McKinsey & Company (2024): The Economic Potential of Generative AI. McKinsey Global Institute. Available at: https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/the-economic-potential-of-generative-ai
  9. IW Köln — Cologne Institute for Economic Research (2025): AI and Labor Market: Automation Potentials in Germany. Available at: https://www.iwkoeln.de/studien/
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  13. Fraunhofer IPA (2025): Machine Vision in Quality Assurance. Available at: https://www.ipa.fraunhofer.de/de/Kompetenzen/bild-und-signalverarbeitung.html
  14. International Federation of Robotics (2025): World Robotics 2025 — Industrial Robots. Available at: https://ifr.org/worldrobotics/
  15. Universal Robots (2025): Cobot Market Germany — Trends and Data. Available at: https://www.universal-robots.com/de/
  16. Amazon (2025): Amazon Robotics — Facts and Figures. Available at: https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/operations/amazon-robotics
  17. LogisticsIQ (2025): Warehouse Automation Market — Europe Forecast 2024–2030. Available at: https://www.thelogisticsiq.com/research/warehouse-automation-market/
  18. Nikkei Asia (2024): Japan's care robots go mainstream as worker shortage deepens. Available at: https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Technology/
  19. BMBF (2025): Robotics in Care — Funding Program. Available at: https://www.bmbf.de/bmbf/de/forschung/digitalisierung-und-technologie/robotik-in-der-pflege
  20. BMAS (2025): Skilled Immigration Act — Implementation Report. Available at: https://www.bmas.de/DE/Arbeit/Fachkraeftesicherung/fachkraefteeinwanderungsgesetz.html
  21. Federal Foreign Office (2025): Visa Statistics 2024. Available at: https://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/de/service/visa-und-aufenthalt
  22. BIBB — Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training (2025): Training in SMEs — Utilization of Public Funding. Available at: https://www.bibb.de/de/

About the Author: Dirk Röthig is CEO of VERDANTIS Impact Capital, headquartered in Zug, Switzerland. As an entrepreneur and impact investor, he analyzes the economic effects of demographic change and invests in technologies that address structural bottlenecks in care, agriculture, and industry. Contact and more articles: verdantiscapital.com | LinkedIn | dirkdirk2424@gmail.com

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