Majority of Germans see immigration as opportunity: survey

BERLIN, March 19 (Xinhua) -- Fifty-three percent of Germans are seeing immigration into Germany as an opportunity, according to a survey by Berlin-based consultancy pollytix on behalf of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation published on Tuesday.

The survey found that 29 percent of Germans are not considering immigration as an opportunity while 17 percent are neutral.

"The majority of Germans are still immigration-friendly and see immigrants as social and cultural enrichment," Rainer Faus, managing director of pollytix and co-author of the study, told Xinhua on Tuesday.

Almost half of the survey's respondents agreed that "Germany should be a tolerant and cosmopolitan country in which everyone can develop freely, no matter where they come from, what they believe in or how they live."

Humanitarian considerations would also play a "decisive role in the acceptance of immigration" as the majority of Germans were willing to accept people who flee from war or persecution based on religious, political or sexual orientation.

However, Germany is somewhat divided on the cultural benefits of immigrations as almost every third respondent did not agree that immigrants enrich cultural and social life in Germany. Also, Germans were reluctant to accept people who flee for economic reasons and from poverty, the survey showed.

The benefits of immigration to Germany's labor market are least disputed. "The immigration of skilled workers in particular is seen as necessary," said Faus.

Overall, almost two out of three Germans believe that Germany needs foreign labor to counter the shortage of skilled labor. Among "cosmopolitan orientated" Germans surveyed, a huge majority of 82 percent agreed with this assessment.

The German economy is requiring at least 260,000 skilled immigrant workers per year by 2060 to offset the declining supply of workforce caused by the country's aging population, according to a study by Bertelsmann Foundation published in February.

Even if men and women in Germany worked equal hours and the pension age was raised from 67 to 70 years, the demand for skilled labor in Germany will not be satisfied, the Bertelsmann study found.

According to Tuesday's survey by pollytix, Germans showed the highest willingness to accept immigrants if they were qualified workers and specialists. One in two respondents of the survey even believed that Germany should attract more skilled workers as immigrants.