70 years after the primary recruitment settlement, Germany is the primary nation for Italians to to migrate, particularly for well-educated folks. It’s about profession prospects – and maybe it is also based mostly on the recollections of the primary “guest workers”.
The German freshmen course on the Goethe Institute in Rome focuses on the subject of foods and drinks on this present day. About a dozen folks of all ages sit throughout from instructor Stephanie Schulze, the phrases hamburger, cheese, salad, espresso making the rounds.
Livia quickly needs to have the ability to speak about extra than simply meals. The 26-year-old from Rome just lately completed her research and is on the lookout for a job as an engineer in Germany. Preferably in Berlin, however Hamburg or Munich would even be okay.
Livia is curious about going overseas; she was in Oslo as a scholar with the Erasmus program and in Germany for a couple of months after her research, she says. German engineering has an excellent popularity – nevertheless it’s primarily about cash and prospects.
Emigration vacation spot Number 1
“Here in Italy you get your university degree and then you start some internship for which you don’t even get 1,000 euros a month. When I looked abroad, I realized that you really get money for entry-level positions, like a normal job.”
So she utilized to Germany – and realized that with out data of German it will be tough. That’s why she’s sitting right here within the course, similar to one other younger engineer.
Last yr, Germany was the number one emigration vacation spot for Italians, in accordance with the report “Italians in the World” by the Fondazione Migrantes of the Italian Bishops’ Conference. And: Last yr, extra Italians emigrated than ever earlier than prior to now 20 years.
First candidates, handpicked
The phenomenon of emigration from Italy to Germany just isn’t new. In the Federal Republic of Germany within the Nineteen Fifties and Nineteen Sixties, the financial system was booming and there was a scarcity of staff within the so-called financial miracle nation, whereas unemployment was excessive in Italy. That’s why the Federal Republic concluded its first recruitment settlement on December 20, 1955, with Italy.
Just a few months later, in April 1956, the primary so-called visitor staff got here to Germany. In emigration facilities in Verona and Naples, a German fee chosen appropriate candidates for vacant positions in Germany from the Italian candidates. Later, Italians had been additionally in a position to apply straight in Germany.
Actually, the visitor staff had been solely supposed to remain in Germany for a restricted time after which return. However, many introduced their households with them and settled completely in Germany.
The newest figures from the Federal Statistical Office present: In 2024, there have been nonetheless 67,000 former visitor staff from Italy residing in Germany who had immigrated to work between 1955 and 1973 – when the recruitment part ended. Others have gone again.
“It was enough for dinner and occasionally for the cinema”
Like Agostino de Stefano. He is now 88 years previous and lives in Corviale, an enormous high-rise on the outskirts of Rome. In the Nineteen Sixties he labored close to Stuttgart, initially in development and later as a automotive mechanic.
He could not discover a job in Campania that will enable him to assist his spouse and younger son, so he sought his fortune in Germany. The starting wasn’t straightforward, he says. In the primary 18 months there wasn’t sufficient cash for a house trip. “I sent what little I earned in my job to my wife. And I lived on what I earned on the side. That was enough for food and occasionally for the cinema.”
When he did not but converse German, he was typically insulted, he says. But over time he realized the language, with none language course, and he nonetheless remembers a few of the phrases to this present day.
German delicacies within the early Nineteen Sixties was tough for a lot of “guest workers” to digest. After all, like right here in Wolfsburg in 1962, there was already spaghetti again then.
And ultimately he received alongside nicely with the Germans. They valued him as a tough employee, he says, and he even turned a foreman. And though he by no means received used to German meals and at all times cooked Italian meals, in some unspecified time in the future he may nonetheless think about staying in Germany.
A small condominium for lease, a room, rest room, kitchen – that was his concept. The youngster ought to stick with the mother-in-law in Italy. But then his spouse turned sick for 4 and a half years. “And at some point it became clear that this couldn’t continue, and I had to make a decision. And I quit and went back to Italy. But I couldn’t find any work at first.”
Trust in a return
No prospects in Italy, however enticing job alternatives in Germany – in some methods the tales of the 88-year-old employee Agostino and the 26-year-old engineer Livia sound fairly related, though there are such a lot of many years in between.
But does Livia additionally really feel like a future visitor employee? Yes, she says, “somehow yes. But I want to believe that I am much more privileged because my family has my back. If things don’t go well in Germany, I can go back to Italy and then look for another job abroad. That wasn’t the case with the guest workers back then.”
She would nonetheless wish to have extra prospects, particularly for younger folks in Italy. So that younger Italians can actually freely resolve whether or not they wish to go overseas – or whether or not they would somewhat keep.
https://www.tagesschau.de/ausland/europa/italien-auswanderung-deutschland-100.html