The Integration of Refugees in Germany: Intergovernmental Aspects of Public Sector Costs and Benefits

Gisela Färber and Dominique Köppen

International Journal of Public Administration, 2020, vol. 43, issue 2, 102-114

Abstract: In this paper, the 2015/16 budgetary effects of refugee immigration in Germany are analyzed. The Public sector spends billions of Euros to accommodate and supply refugees and to integrate those into the labor markets who have a perspective for a permanent or even medium-term residence permit. In case of a successful integration, we can expect flow backs in the form of income tax revenues and social security contributions. The costs and financial benefits of several types of refugees are modelled and – weighted with the number of cases – added to a public sector ‘financial balance’. Financial ‘profitability’ depends on labor market integration, the volume of labor participation and the future income earned, which depends on qualification, education and training. The levels of government will experience diverging cost-benefit balances. They will only receive future flow backs in the form of their share in the income tax revenues if refugees find jobs within their territories. Administrative efforts should concentrate on a successful labor market integration of refugees and no longer continue the policy of preventing them from entering the labor market for many years and thereby making them heavily dependent on public transfer payments.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01900692.2019.1672190 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:lpadxx:v:43:y:2020:i:2:p:102-114

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/lpad20

DOI: 10.1080/01900692.2019.1672190

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Public Administration is currently edited by Ali Farazmand

More articles in International Journal of Public Administration from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().