Unfilled Training Places in Germany – Regional and Company-Specific Determinants

The current situation on the German apprenticeship market is characterised by two contradictory developments. On the one side, companies have increasing problems in filling the training places they offer, and the number of vacant training places is climbing. On the other side, the transition into training is still difficult for many young people, and the number of unplaced training-place seekers is rising. Hence matching supply with demand is becoming increasingly problematic in the market for training places.

Taking the companies’ perspective, our paper wants to give a closer insight into the phenomenon of unfilled training places. It provides an overview of the structure and development of vacant training places and attempts to explain the vacancies by investigating the factors which lie behind the firms’ inability to fill their training places. We assume that training place vacancies are not only due to internal company reasons like firm size, sector affiliation, employment structure or skills needs, but also to general regional conditions. Therefore, our analysis also takes account of characteristics like the population structure (e.g., population density) or the labour market situation (e.g., unemployment rate) within a region.

Our empirical analysis is based on the IAB-Establishment Panel, a representative survey of almost 16,000 establishments carried out annually in Germany. This data is complemented by data from the official statistics of the Federal Employment Agency and the Federal Statistical Office in order to capture the impact of regional determinants.

First results show that small and medium sized enterprises have greater problems in filling their training places than larger companies have. Besides, firms in Eastern Germany are exposed to a higher risk of being unable to fill their training places than firms in Western Germany.