Deindustrialization - By Country - Germany - Currently

Currently

In the early 2000s, the unemployment in Germany was very high, while industrial output was steadily increasing. Germany's startling unemployment rate of roughly seven percent (OECD, 2008) is by and large due to the continuing struggles with the reunification process between East and West Germany that began in 1990. However, the unemployment rate has been declining since 2005, when it reached its peak of over ten percent. In the 2010s, Germany's unemployment rate has been one of the lowest in continental Europe.

Germany's economy was ranked third largest in the world (measured by GDP, Wikipedia, 2008), and exports over a trillion dollars worth of goods every year. This notion of deindustrialization may be an inaccurate label for what is really happening in Germany. Germany is producing more with less labor; a product of improving efficiency. Another factor that is camouflaged by deindustrialization is that the labour market has shifted from industry to service. On the surface, it appears that deindustrialisation is occurring in Germany (and all over the world), but it may be just a shift in interests that are generating these statistics. 33.4% of Germany's workforce is in the industrial sector, whereas 63.8% work in the service sector (and the remainder work in agriculture). Germany's recent history has made quite a difference in its economic standing; it has been through a lot of peaks and valleys over the past few decades.