Frankfurt am Main- Chronic investment restraint in mechanical and plant engineering is increasingly putting the competitiveness of Germany’s strongest industrial industry under pressure. This is shown by the “Trendmerner 2025″, a current industry -wide operating council survey by IG Metall. “With their investment brake, the executive floors are jeopardizing the future viability of one of the German core industries. This can cost thousands of jobs and endangers the industrial location in the long term, ”warns Jürgen Kerner, second chairman of IG Metall. “The companies now have to significantly expand the defensive and rethinking that investments – especially in research and development – enable urgently needed innovations. It is high time to tear around the rudder. ” For this, the political framework in Berlin must be set quickly.
Clear warning signals: lack of investments lead to the loss of competitiveness
Only half of the works councils surveyed (53 percent) generally consider the competitiveness of the industry to be good or very good. The statement that the products are competitive can no longer agree with significantly more than a third of the works councils (37 percent). “For a technology industry that lives significantly from export, this is an extremely questionable development with which we do not come to terms with,” said Jürgen Kerner.
From the IG Metall’s point of view, this development is a direct consequence of a lack of investments in recent years. It is all the more disturbing that a trend reversal is still not recognizable: the expected development of investments and investments in research and development remains at a low level at 14 percent. 52 percent of companies plan to let them remain at the existing low level. 34 percent even assume a further reduction.
Companies strategy is harmful to the industrial location
From the IG Metall’s point of view, the measures that companies take instead are not suitable for developing the industry forward. 36 percent of those surveyed state that relocations are underway, planned or already carried out in the past 12 months. In addition, in 62 percent of the companies, re- and restructuring has already been ongoing, are already running or have been carried out in the past 12 months. 29 percent of works councils expect the number of employees to drop in the next 12 months. In the case of temporary people, 34 percent of a decrease, and 26 percent in the case of temporary work. “These persistent developments endanger the substance of Germany’s industrial location in favor of short -term cost optimization of companies,” warns Kerner. “Machine and plant engineering must start an investment offensive.”
Politics must create a reliable framework for investments
In addition to the companies, IG Metall sees politics as a duty: from the point of view of a clear majority (61 percent), too high and less reliable energy prices stand in the way of improvement in competitiveness. 47 percent believe that the acceleration of planning and approval procedures would improve competitiveness. If bureaucracy was realized, 64 percent expect competitiveness to improve. Jürgen Kerner: “The Union under Friedrich Merz is the responsibility to quickly form a stable government and address these problems immediately. The companies and employees now need clear signals and a reliable framework for investments in Germany. The new federal government must set attractive incentives for private investments and even massively invest in the infrastructure. “
The trend detector is a survey of works councils in machine and plant engineering carried out annually since 2017 by IG Metall. He captures her view of the industry. This year he was added to questions about competitiveness. More than 630 works councils took part in the current survey.
On the survey results: Trend detector 2025