With regard to its territorial size, economy and political power; Germany represents one of the most sustainable, competitive and economically developed Member States of the European Union. However, development of the knowledge-based economy on one hand and negative demographic trends on the other hand will force Germany to cover the growing demand for high-skilled labour force from non-EU countries in the coming years to keep this position. The paper analyses competitiveness within the framework of security and sustainability of the Federal Republic of Germany concerning labour migration from the third countries. Main research question of this article is formulated as follows: How can migration from the third countries influence economic development and competitiveness of Germany in terms of state’s demographic problems? With regard to the above, we try to verify our hypothesis claiming that compensation of the domestic workforce through regulated migration flows – necessary because of declining and aging population and skill disharmony in Germany – is only a short-time solution of the current situation on the German labour market, but it is not sustainable in the long run.
International migration has become a key challenge and concern in the European Union (EU) and most part of the word. On the one hand, the freedom to move to another Member State is the right guaranteed for all the EU citizens. On the other hand, emigration or immigration is a longstanding concern for policy makers in many countries. Generally, human capital is one of the future sustainable competitiveness resources. Moreover, now, as the Lisbon Strategy is being replaced by the new EU strategy Europe 2020 for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth (2010), there is evidence that mobility in the EU will increase. In order to achieve the goals of the strategy Europe 2020 (2010), especially employment target, the flagship initiative “Youth on the Move” places a lot of emphasis on mobility as in moving to another country to study, train or work. The perceptions of this research show that growing mobility can be followed with new migration trends in the future. Moreover, no single answer to the question what level of migration (emigration or immigration) should be tolerated in the context of sustainable developing economy could be provided. This research not only confirms this observation and theoretical problem of “sustainable migration” but goes much further by discussing the reasons why one of the highest emigration rates in the EU happened to be found in Lithuania.