«Manpower is running out, foreigners are needed»
There is a catastrophic shortage of workers in Russia. Therefore, our labor market will be replenished by migrants. According to the forecast of the Research Institute of Labor, by 2030 an additional 50,000 immigrants from the countries of the former USSR will enter the country every year. In fact, every twentieth worker on the territory of the Russian Federation will be a guest worker. Is it good or bad for the domestic economy?
The published study also provides other figures. In particular, the share of labor migrants among the employed population by 2030 will be 4.7% — against today's 4.2%. Their total number in seven years will be 3.5 million people — 400 thousand more than it was in 2022.
According to the authors, trade, transportation, construction and services have special views on guest workers. Here, mainly the so-called linear personnel are in demand: couriers, pizza delivery men, loaders, packers, handymen …
For some reason, the agricultural sector of the economy was not included in the list of the main industries that are waiting for migrants with open arms. Although they are also very needed here — especially in the fall, before the harvesting campaign. If spring sowing is carried out, as a rule, mechanized, then the situation with harvesting is much more complicated. Most often it is migrants who walk around the field with bags, picking potatoes or carrots — the local population, as practice shows, does not go to such work for any price.
In general, according to farmers, people in the Russian countryside drink themselves into drinking, and migrant workers in the Moscow region are asking for a salary of at least 80,000 rubles. And this is when working on a farm, distributing fodder and cleaning manure, where labor is completely unskilled.
The Russian labor market, for various reasons, is going through hard times. Therefore, we have long been accustomed to foreign janitors in our entrance or to a cashier in a store with a “non-Slavic appearance”. Yes, sometimes heated discussions flare up that they “came in large numbers here” and occupy the jobs of the indigenous population.
Few people believe that there are only 4.2% of migrants in our labor market. Those who use the metro in the morning say that more than half of the visitors are on the subway. So, do guest workers bring good or evil to the domestic labor market?
— In the current conditions, we cannot do without labor migrants, — Alexey Zubets, a professor at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, answers the question of MK. — Russia's workforce is dwindling, unemployment in the country is at an all-time low. According to the latest data, 2.9%. There is a real shortage of personnel.
— There are only two ways out of this situation. To attract working hands from the outside, which is what we are doing today. Or to increase labor productivity in their industries. Salary grows only if there is investment in capital. They used to say that two soldiers from the construction battalion replace the excavator. Now it is clear that we still need an excavator. Especially if hard workers ask for a pay rise. And in order to increase labor productivity, it is necessary to purchase new modern equipment, modernize production. Here we, as they say, begin and end.
If there is an importation of migrants, but there is no investment, we automatically doom ourselves to low wages, which is wrong. There are two ways to go: to attract foreigners and at the same time invest in investments, in the re-equipment of production.
— I agree. If you use taxi services, you probably noticed that there are practically no Russians among the drivers. They were forced out of this business by immigrants from Central Asia. Perhaps there is some resentment or jealousy. But the work of a taxi driver is not the highest paid, in this industry there is a high turnover of personnel. In the end, such competition pushes our fellow citizens to find themselves in other professions — highly paid ones. Hundreds of thousands of jobs are being created today in manufacturing, in the IT sector. They need knowledge, high qualifications — this is where Russians should strive. Here, of course, there can be simply no competition with migrants.