fbpx

German experts say it can afford refugee costs

refugeesGermany will be able to meet the necessary expenditure for refugee care and will even derive economic benefit from the new migrants.

The pronouncement came from an independent panel of top economists, the German Council of Economic Experts, in their annual forecast.

Its study found that the costs, such as food, housing, education, German lessons, vocational training, would total more than €21 billion in 2015.

The country’s finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, last week said that he would be able to fund the costs without endangering his policy of running a budget surplus.

The council agreed that the necessary spending will not overburden the economy.

But it warned the government that "longer asylum processes and poor integration into the labour market could drastically increase costs."

Overall, the economists said that Germany could expect its healthy economic performance to continue into 2016.

They forecast GDP to grow by 1.7% for the whole of 2015 and 1.6% in 2016.

But "the refugee crisis means that it has become even more important to ensure the German economy is fit for the future by setting up appropriate conditions" for business to flourish, they said.

Pin It