BERLIN, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- The number of vacancies for IT specialists in Germany more than doubled within two years to 124,000, according to a study by the digital association Bitkom published on Thursday.
With 65 percent, a large majority of the 850 managing directors and human resource managers of German companies surveyed estimated that the shortage of IT specialists would even increase further in the coming years.
"The lack of IT experts no longer only affects the IT industry, but the entire economy as well as administration, authorities and science," said Bitkom President Achim Berg.
"As digitalization accelerates, the demand for IT specialists will continue to grow strongly in the coming years," Berg said.
In every sixth German company, IT positions remained vacant for more than half a year. According to the study, job positions in IT would be much harder for companies to fill than any other position.
Berg warned that the lack of IT experts "threatens the competitiveness of our entire economy."
To address the lack of IT specialists in the short term, Bitkom suggested increasing the flexibility of Germany's labor law for the IT sector so that IT specialists could freely divide their working time within the framework of a maximum weekly working time.
In the long term, Bitkom advised attracting "significantly more" young people, especially women, to computer science studies or IT training as well as to reduce the dropout rate at universities and a nationwide teaching of computer science in school.
