Auswirkungen der EU-Erweiterung auf Wachstum und Beschäftigung in Deutschland und ausgewählten EU-Mitgliedstaaten

Abstract

"The study 'Effect of EU enlargement on growth and employment in Germany and selected EU member states' is the first study to provide an appraisal of what has been achieved so far in the course of the fifth round of EU enlargement and an estimate of the future developments for Germany, taking into particular account the EU accession of Bulgaria and Romania. The study comes to the conclusion that Germany has so far definitely benefited in economic terms from the EU enlargement to include the ten new member states in Central and Eastern Europe. The EU accession of Bulgaria and Romania, too, which took place on 1 January 2007, will have a slightly positive effect on the development of Germany's economy as a whole according to the study. The positive effect for Germany of the fifth round of enlargement, which was completed by the accession of Bulgaria and Romania, is of a magnitude of approximately 1% of Germany's gross domestic product (GDP) in the long term according to the study. The foreign trade potentials for Germany are not yet exhausted in the long term. According to considerations based on growth theory and foreign trade theory, the process of convergence of the new member states is leading to a further intensification of trade. In particular the increases in foreign trade with the new member states, which continued after 2004, point in this direction. In contrast, the negative effects on growth and employment due to relocations are likely to be quite small, even though there are individual cases of production being relocated to Eastern Europe. Although immigration to Germany from the eight new member states (without Malta and Cyprus) has continued to grow since these countries joined the EU, the level has remained well behind the predictions owing to the transitional arrangements. Because the regulations concerning the free movement of labour differ from country to country, there have been significant diversions of migration to Great Britain and Ireland as these countries did not introduce restrictions. Ultimately, however, it is not possible at present to quantify either the extent of the diversion effects or the level of the migration potential that would follow a liberalisation of the free movement for labour for Germany. The study was conducted on behalf of the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology by the following institutes: GEFRA - Institute for Financial and Regional Analyses (Münster), IAB - Institute for Employment Research (Nuremberg), WIFO - Austrian Institute of Economic Research (Vienna) and CE - Cambridge Econometrics (Cambridge, UK)." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Cite article

Untiedt, G., Alecke, B., Baas, T., Biffl, G., Brücker, H., Fritz, O., Gardiner, B., Hönekopp, E., Huber, P., Lamour, A. & Mitze, T. (2007): Auswirkungen der EU-Erweiterung auf Wachstum und Beschäftigung in Deutschland und ausgewählten EU-Mitgliedstaaten. (IAB-Bibliothek 311), Nürnberg, 479 p.