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Germany’s sick-leave debate misreads the real problem, researchers say

Germany sick leave rules

Germany is preparing to tighten its rules on medical certificates for sick employees, but researchers who study the country’s rising absenteeism rates argue the government may be targeting the wrong cause. They point instead to mental health pressures and worsening conditions in fields such as nursing, care work and teaching.

German workers took roughly 22 sick days on average in 2024, one of the highest rates among wealthy nations. The figure comes from BKK, an association representing company health insurers, and it jumped in 2022 after Germany introduced electronic sick-note reporting, a shift that captured short-term absences more accurately than the paper system it replaced.

Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s coalition wants to scrap telephone sick notes and let employers demand medical certificates starting on the first day an employee calls in sick. Officials frame the change as part of a broader effort to lift productivity in an economy dealing with an aging workforce and years of sluggish growth.

Where the sick days concentrate

Researchers who study labor markets and mental health say the absenteeism data points somewhere specific: professions marked by chronic understaffing, low pay, thin career advancement and heavy emotional demands.

BKK figures for 2024, the most recent year with sector-level breakdowns, show women in healthcare and social work took 27 sick days on average and teachers took 24. Workers in finance took 18 and those in communication took 16.

Johannes Siegrist, an emeritus professor at the University of Duesseldorf, said the underlying issue often falls short of a clinical diagnosis. “It doesn’t need to be a full-blown depression,” he said. “It can also be a state of exhaustion or burnout as a result of problematic working conditions.”

Mental disorders account for just 4.8% of sickness cases, according to AOK, Germany’s largest health insurer. But when they do occur, they lead to an average of 28 days away from work. AOK data also shows sick days linked to mental health issues among its members have climbed 47% since 2014, making mental health the second-largest driver of absence after respiratory illness.

A mismatch between demands and rewards

Siegrist described the specific strain facing healthcare, education and social services workers as a combination of high responsibility and low compensation. “They have jobs with high responsibility, they need to combine task performance and social interaction and they have to deal with emotional problems, but also with physical stressors, including violence,” he said. “And often these are low-paid people with a rather low socioeconomic status.”

Occupational health scholars have a term for this pattern: effort-reward imbalance, where employees face intense demands without corresponding pay, status or job security. A substantial body of international research links that imbalance to mental health problems and extended absences from work. It has also been tied to a higher risk of coronary heart disease.

Germany’s schools show the pattern clearly. The 2024 German School Barometer found that nearly half of teachers reported psychological or physical violence among students at their school. More than a third said they felt emotionally exhausted several times a week.

Nursing shows a similar strain. Staff shortages remain acute across the sector, yet recent German studies have found wage growth has stayed limited, particularly in hospitals and public institutions, even as the workload on remaining staff intensifies.

Germany’s health ministry declined to comment when asked why absenteeism runs highest in the sectors facing the heaviest mental health and emotional pressures.

Little evidence of abuse

None of this means mental health alone explains Germany’s absenteeism levels. Sick leave rates depend on a mix of factors, including demographics, workplace conditions, social norms and differences between national institutions, which makes comparing countries directly difficult.

Germany’s sick-pay system is also among the most generous anywhere. Employers replace 100% of wages starting on the first day of illness, for up to six weeks. Even so, seven OECD countries, Norway, Slovenia, Spain, Finland, France, Portugal and Belgium, report higher rates of sick leave among full-time employees than Germany does.

Sofia Malinai Domagk, a researcher at the OECD, said sick leave rules explain only part of the picture. “What we can say is that sick leave rules are one factor among many, and we would caution against reading too much into direct country comparisons of sick leave rates,” she said.

Researchers who have examined Germany’s absenteeism increase say they have found little sign of widespread abuse of the system. A joint study by the health insurer DAK and the IGES institute concluded that the sharp rise in recorded absences in 2022 came mainly from improved electronic reporting combined with unusually strong waves of respiratory illness and COVID-19 infections. Sick day totals have leveled off since then.

The same study found no evidence that telephone sick notes, introduced in 2020 during the pandemic, contributed to the surge. Researchers concluded that neither phone-based certification nor routine misuse of the system accounted for the record sickness levels recorded in recent years.

Enzo Weber of the Institute of Employment Research summarized the findings directly. “The available scientific studies suggest that sick leave by phone has not led to an increase in sick leave reports,” he said.

Unions and doctors push back

The government’s proposed changes have drawn criticism from Verdi, the services union, which said the plan reflects a “culture of mistrust” toward workers. Associations representing doctors said requiring certificates from the first day of absence would be “absolutely disastrous” for medical practices already stretched thin.

Facing that pushback, the government said it would give companies flexibility. Employers can choose whether to adopt the new first-day certificate requirement or stick with the existing rule requiring a doctor’s note starting on the fourth day of illness.

The debate leaves Germany with an open question. Whether tighter documentation requirements can meaningfully reduce absenteeism remains unproven, while the sectors driving the country’s sick-leave numbers, healthcare, education and care work, continue to face the staffing shortages, pay stagnation and emotional strain that researchers say sit at the root of the problem.

Picture of George Mensah

George Mensah

George Mensah is a Senior Political & Conflict Correspondent at ClicxPost, covering global politics, international conflict, and economic developments. With five years of experience in breaking news and geopolitical reporting, he delivers fast, accurate analysis on major world events.

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July 26, 2026 No Comments

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July 24, 2026 No Comments

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July 24, 2026 No Comments

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A mediator caught between Riyadh and Beijing Pakistan’s position as a potential mediator has grown more complicated by the day. Earlier this week, Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi movement declared a naval blockade against Saudi Arabia, a close ally of Islamabad that signed a mutual defense treaty with Pakistan last year. Pakistan relies on Saudi financial support, and Islamabad has firmly condemned the Houthi attacks on Saudi tankers. Appearing too receptive to Iranian arguments risks frustrating Riyadh at a time when Pakistan needs that relationship intact. At the same time, Islamabad depends just as heavily on Beijing, which has also served as a major financial backer of Pakistan and has its own economic interests in reopening Middle Eastern trade routes. Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar, discussed the new Middle East mediation effort with Chinese officials during a visit to China last week, all three Pakistani sources said. “The Chinese are unhappy because Iran’s attacks on other Gulf states and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz are hitting their interests,” a Pakistani government official said. Disruptions in the Red Sea would hit another trade route Beijing relies on, compounding the damage already done by the near-closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Dar and the Pakistani military’s public relations wing did not respond to requests for comment. China’s foreign ministry addressed the effort directly in a statement, saying “China supports the mediation efforts made by Pakistan and other parties.” The ministry added that Beijing will continue to “play an active role in restoring peace and tranquillity in the Middle East Gulf region as soon as possible.” Why Beijing wants this war over China’s stake in ending the conflict runs deeper than diplomatic language suggests. Beijing is Iran’s largest trading partner and the primary buyer of Iranian crude oil despite international sanctions on Tehran, purchases that come with a steep discount on the price of that oil. Over the past several years, China has also expanded its support for Iran’s security through dual-use components, chip equipment and satellite navigation systems, even though it has not overtly provided military aid to Iran since the war began. That relationship gives China leverage that Washington and Riyadh do not have, and Beijing has used it before. China has consistently backed Pakistan’s mediation efforts, and in March it dispatched its special envoy on a shuttle-diplomacy trip around the Middle East aimed at calming tensions before this latest round of fighting broke out. Pakistan’s current role builds on an earlier, unsuccessful attempt to end the war. The United States and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding in June to move toward ending the conflict, after mediation by both Pakistan and Qatar. That agreement was meant to open a 60-day window for negotiating a permanent settlement. Indirect talks during that window yielded no progress. Both sides accused the other of violating the terms, and fighting resumed. Houthi attacks raise the price of any new talks The renewed diplomacy now has to contend with a war that has grown in scope since the June memorandum collapsed. The Houthis said Thursday that they struck two Saudi oil tankers as part of their declared naval blockade, a move that threatens to open a second chokepoint for global oil supplies alongside the already near-closed Strait of Hormuz. For Pakistan, that escalation raises both the stakes of successful mediation and the difficulty of achieving it. A halt in attacks on Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations would now be a “pre-requisite for any talks to resume,” a Pakistani official said. Pakistan has already conveyed that message to Iran directly, the official added, an indication that Islamabad sees the Houthi blockade as the immediate barrier standing between Momeni’s visits and any actual negotiation. That condition puts Pakistan in a difficult spot with Tehran. Iran has shown no public sign of reining in the Houthis, whom it backs, and Momeni’s back-to-back trips to Islamabad suggest Iran wants to keep a diplomatic channel open even as the fighting it’s connected to intensifies elsewhere in the region. Whether Tehran is willing or able to press the Houthis to stand down is a separate question from whether it wants talks with Washington to resume, and Pakistani officials have not said which answer they’re getting from Momeni. A narrow window, if one exists at all For now, Pakistan’s effort remains at the exploratory stage. Momeni’s meetings with Pakistani government leaders and army chief Asim Munir signal that Iran is willing to use Islamabad as a conduit, and China’s public endorsement gives Pakistan cover to keep pursuing the role. But the sources involved were consistent on one point: the obstacles to getting Washington and Tehran back to the table remain high, and nothing so far has bridged them. The failure of the June memorandum offers a preview of how hard that will be. A 60-day negotiating window produced accusations instead of an agreement, and the war resumed within weeks of the truce collapsing. Pakistan is now trying to open a second window under worse conditions, with a new front in the Red Sea, a Saudi ally demanding a halt to Houthi attacks before any talks begin, and a Chinese patron pushing for a resolution that protects its own oil and trade interests. Whether Momeni’s visits translate into anything beyond exploratory contact will likely depend on whether Iran is willing, or able, to meet the precondition Pakistan has already delivered: attacks on Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states have to stop first.

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u.s. missiles strike iran

U.S. missiles hit targets across Iran after Trump vows “major military punishment” over Red Sea attacks

July 24, 2026 No Comments

U.S. missiles struck targets across Iran on Friday, hours after President Donald Trump vowed “major military punishment” against Tehran and its Houthi allies in Yemen for extending the Middle East war to a second major shipping chokepoint at the mouth of the Red Sea. The strikes hit a Revolutionary Guards Navy headquarters in the Caspian Sea province of Gilan and the port city of Bandar Anzali, while a separate attack on the city of Ahvaz killed four people and wounded five, according to Iran’s state broadcaster IRIB. The strikes came two weeks after the collapse of an interim truce meant to end the war. Iran’s armed forces responded by firing at U.S. bases in neighboring Arab countries and warning residents there that Iranian forces may target non-military buildings used by U.S. personnel. The exchange marks a sharp escalation in a conflict that has already killed thousands of people over nearly five months, driven up global inflation and stoked fears of a broader economic downturn. Houthis widen the war to a second chokepoint The immediate trigger for Friday’s strikes traces back to the Houthis, the Yemeni armed group that controls northern and western Yemen. The Houthis announced a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia, a country that has been diverting millions of barrels of oil each day by pipeline to the Red Sea specifically to avoid Iran’s near-total blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. That workaround no longer holds if the Red Sea route itself comes under attack. On Thursday, Houthi fighters struck two Saudi tankers in the Bab el-Mandeb strait at the southern entrance to the Red Sea. Oil prices jumped 7% in response, pushing crude above $100 a barrel for the first time since May. By around 1600 GMT on Friday, Brent futures had pulled back, falling more than $4 to just above $96, as markets absorbed the news of the U.S. strikes on Iran. The Bab el-Mandeb attacks forced several other tankers to reverse course and head north through the Suez Canal instead, a detour that can mean sailing around Africa to reach markets in Asia. Shipping insurance costs through the southern Red Sea doubled for some companies on Thursday, according to sources familiar with the pricing. Despite the disruption, half of the 18 ships that exited Bab el-Mandeb on Thursday were still carrying crude oil, including two Chinese supertankers willing to take the risk. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz told a different story: only one tanker crossed the strait on Thursday, the lowest daily count since May 7, underscoring how effectively Iran’s blockade there has already throttled that route. Amid the escalation, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi spoke by phone with his Omani counterpart about security developments and maritime navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, which runs between the two countries, according to a statement posted to Araqchi’s Telegram channel. Oman has periodically served as a back-channel between Washington and Tehran, and the timing of the call suggests Muscat may be trying to keep some line of communication open even as fighting spreads. A possible opening for talks, via Pakistan Even as the military situation deteriorates, there are signs of diplomatic movement on the margins. Sources said Pakistan is exploring a path toward resuming stalled talks between the United States and Iran over ending the war, an effort that follows a push initiated by China. Exploratory discussions took place this week during a visit to Islamabad by Iran’s Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni, his second trip to Pakistan in the last 10 days, according to three Pakistani sources. All three sources cautioned that the obstacles to any actual talks with the United States remain high. Momeni’s back-to-back visits suggest Tehran is at least testing the waters, but nothing in the reporting points to a breakthrough, and the pace of strikes on both sides on Friday indicates the fighting is, for now, outrunning the diplomacy. Trump threatens harder strikes as casualties mount Trump laid out his position on social media, saying he would hold Iran accountable for any further attacks by Yemeni fighters and that “major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran and, of course, the Houthis, themselves.” In an interview with Axios, he went further, saying he was considering relaunching major combat operations against Iran. “They haven’t received enough pain yet,” Axios quoted him as saying. The human cost on the Iranian side has been steep. Iran’s health ministry said in a statement on X that 59 people had been killed and 666 wounded since clashes with U.S. forces resumed in late June. Iranian media separately cited the head of Iran’s top joint military command as saying Iran would kill a member of the U.S. forces for every Iranian killed, a statement that signals Tehran intends to match casualties rather than de-escalate. American losses have also mounted. The war has killed 18 U.S. service members. The Pentagon said Monday that 100 service members had been injured since July 7, though it noted 96% of them have already returned to duty, a detail the Pentagon appears to be using to frame the injuries as largely non-catastrophic. Strikes hit bases from Kuwait to Iraq’s Kurdish region Iran’s response to Trump’s threat played out across multiple countries hosting U.S. forces. The Iranian army said it had attacked U.S. military equipment depots at Al-Adiri, officially known as Camp Buehring, in northern Kuwait, along with U.S. troop positions at Camp Arifjan and Camp Doha near Kuwait City. Kuwait’s government said in the early evening that its air defenses were intercepting “hostile” targets launched from Iran, confirming that incoming fire had reached Kuwaiti airspace. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said separately that they had significantly damaged a surveillance tower used by the U.S. Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, a strike aimed at the naval command that oversees American operations throughout the Gulf. According to the semi-official Tasnim news agency, the Revolutionary Guards also claimed to have hit a U.S. barracks and fighter jets in Jordan, and separately struck a U.S. barracks, a spy balloon and Patriot air defense batteries in Erbil, in Iraq’s Kurdish region. Jordan’s military disputed the scale of that claim. Jordan’s army said it had shot down seven Iranian missiles and six drones, and state television reported that the attack caused no material damage or casualties, a direct contradiction of the more damaging picture Iranian state media presented. The U.S. embassy in Baghdad issued a warning to American citizens in the Middle East to exercise caution and remain on heightened alert, a standard precaution that nonetheless signals Washington expects the fighting to continue spreading rather than wind down. Where the war stands Five months in, the conflict has settled into a pattern of tit-for-tat escalation that keeps finding new fronts. What began as a fight centered on the Strait of Hormuz has now pulled in the Red Sea, Kuwait, Bahrain, Jordan and Iraq’s Kurdish region, with Saudi Arabia’s oil exports and global shipping insurance costs caught in the middle. Iran’s declared policy of matching U.S. casualties one-for-one, combined with Trump’s public threat of “major military punishment,” leaves little room for either side to step back without appearing to concede ground. The Pakistan-brokered feelers toward renewed U.S.-Iran talks, and the Iran-Oman phone call on Strait of Hormuz security, are the only signs of diplomatic activity in the mix. Whether they amount to anything will likely depend on what happens in the days immediately following Friday’s strikes, and on whether Iran follows through on its threat to target buildings used by U.S. personnel in Gulf cities.

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Trump set for “unifying yet vicious” Dinner Speech Friday as press event returns

July 24, 2026 No Comments

President Donald Trump will speak Friday night at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, an event pushed back more than three months after a gunman fired shots outside the original venue. The dinner now moves to the Waldorf Astoria hotel under expanded security, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Wednesday, describing a speech that will mix pointed attacks with laughs. “The president’s speech will be a combination of unifying yet vicious, and serious yet hilarious, all at the same time, if you can imagine that. One thing I can assure you, it will be entertaining,” Leavitt told reporters. Trump will stand before many of the same news organizations his administration has sued, restricted or shut out of briefings over the past year. The dinner, traditionally a night of jokes at the president’s expense delivered by the president himself, arrives this year against a backdrop of legal fights and access battles that have strained the relationship between the White House and the press corps gathered to hear him. What forced the delay The original dinner, a black-tie gathering of journalists, politicians and administration officials, was called off on April 25 when a man tried to force his way through a security checkpoint and fired a shotgun outside the ballroom as Trump and his cabinet were taking their seats. Cole Allen, the suspect, pleaded not guilty in May to charges that include attempting to assassinate the president. Secret Service officer Victor Gonzales was shot at the checkpoint and is credited with stopping the attacker. A protective vest kept him from serious injury, and he was the only person wounded that night. Friday’s rescheduled dinner will honor Gonzales along with Washington Hilton staff who helped guests during the incident, the WHCA said. Secret Service Director Sean Curran briefed reporters Wednesday on preparations at the new venue. “We do expect bad people to show up,” Curran said. “It’s just a reality of where we are, but we’re treating it no differently than any other site that the president goes to.” Trump has cited the April shooting as one reason for a $400 million ballroom now under construction at the White House, arguing that hosting the dinner there in the future would give the Secret Service tighter control over the president’s security. Friday marks Trump’s second time attending the correspondents’ dinner as president and his first time back since the shooting. He boycotted the event throughout his first term. The gala itself has run for more than a century, funding journalism scholarships and marking the First Amendment’s protections for speech and the press. This year’s program pairs Trump’s remarks with a performance from mentalist Oz Pearlman. A year of confrontation over access Trump has sued multiple news outlets since returning to office, dismissed critical coverage as “fake news” and named individual reporters in public criticism. His administration removed the Associated Press from the regular White House press pool and cut back many journalists’ access to the Pentagon. Last week he threatened to pull the broadcast licenses of television networks that skipped his prime-time address on election security, a speech built partly around claims of foreign election interference that ran counter to a U.S. intelligence assessment. White House officials have defended each of these moves as necessary steps to guard sensitive information, tighten security and hold what they call biased outlets accountable. Trump has rejected the idea that any of it amounts to suppressing the press, arguing instead that he’s forcing overdue accountability on an industry he says treats him unfairly. The picture isn’t one-sided. Trump has also given reporters more direct access than several of his recent predecessors, fielding questions during open-ended events and phoning into interviews on his own initiative. That mix, aggressive legal action paired with frequent, informal availability, has become a defining feature of how his administration handles the press. Journalists push the WHCA to speak out Several hundred veteran journalists and eight professional journalism organizations signed a letter asking the WHCA to use Friday’s dinner as an occasion to condemn what they called Trump’s attacks on the First Amendment. The letter reflects broader frustration among press freedom groups over the administration’s lawsuits, access restrictions and threats against broadcasters, criticism Trump has consistently rejected. WHCA President Weijia Jiang said the dinner carries its own message independent of anything Trump says at the podium. The gathering “will be a statement that violence has no place in American life and a free press will not be intimidated into silence,” she said. Friday night will test how those competing messages land in the same room: a president promising a speech that’s “unifying yet vicious,” a press corps pushing back on what it sees as sustained pressure, and a Secret Service detail bracing for the kind of threat that upended the dinner the first time around. The honor paid to Gonzales, the officer shot defending the event in April, will sit alongside all of it, a reminder of how close the tradition came to not returning at all.

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SARB interest rate hike Thursday

South Africa inflation hits 5% two-year high, rate hike expected thursday

July 22, 2026 No Comments

President Cyril Ramaphosa’s central bank looks all but certain to raise interest rates again on Thursday, after fresh data showed inflation running hotter than economists expected. The rand traded at 16.4275 against the dollar at 1431 GMT, little changed from earlier levels, as markets digested the inflation print and positioned for the South African Reserve Bank’s rate decision. Annual headline consumer inflation accelerated to 5.0% in June, a two-year high, from 4.5% in May, Statistics South Africa said Wednesday. That came in above the 4.7% economists polled by Reuters had forecast and above the SARB’s 3% target. On a monthly basis, prices rose 0.7% in June, adding to signs of renewed price pressure on households. Transport costs drove much of the increase, rising 12.7% year-on-year and contributing 1.7 percentage points to the headline figure. Housing, utilities, and insurance and financial services also posted notable annual gains. Goods inflation climbed to 4.8% from 4.4%, while services inflation rose to 5.2% from 4.7%. “Given upside risks to the inflation outlook, concerns about elevated inflation expectations, and the risk of second-round effects, we expect the South African Reserve Bank to raise the repo rate by 25 basis points,” Nedbank economists said in a note. That would mark the SARB’s second consecutive hike. The bank lifted its benchmark repo rate by 25 basis points in May, its first increase in three years, citing the drag from the Middle East conflict on fuel costs. Governor Lesetja Kganyago’s monetary policy committee has flagged that further tightening could follow if the Iran war continues to feed inflation through energy prices. Standard Chartered economist Razia Khan said the unexpected jump in the June inflation figure, combined with worsening household inflation expectations, effectively sealed the case for a July hike. A Bloomberg survey of economists conducted before Wednesday’s release found most expect the SARB to lift its rate to 7.25%. Not everyone agrees a hike is warranted. Johann Els, chief economist at PSG Financial Services, has argued the data show little evidence that energy-driven price increases are spilling over into the broader economy, suggesting the central bank could hold off this week and act later in the year if needed. Some relief may already be in the pipeline. Fuel price cuts that took effect July 1 arrived too late to be captured in the June inflation reading, and economists say they could ease price pressure in coming months if they hold. Separate data released Wednesday showed retail sales rose 2.3% year-on-year in May, building on a revised 1.2% increase in April. The pickup suggests South African consumers are still spending despite the squeeze from higher borrowing costs and rising prices, though a further rate increase this week would add to the pressure on household budgets. Equity markets shrugged off the inflation surprise. The Johannesburg Stock Exchange’s Top-40 index was last up 0.9% on the day. Bonds sold off sharply. South Africa’s benchmark 2035 government bond weakened, pushing its yield up 12 basis points to 8.665%, as investors priced in a tighter monetary policy path and the prospect of borrowing costs staying elevated for longer. The inflation reading lands as South Africa’s central bank weighs how much of the current price pressure stems from global energy markets rather than domestic demand. The SARB has pointed to persistently high oil prices and Middle East tensions as key upside risks to its outlook, alongside a rand that has weakened at times this year against a backdrop of global uncertainty. Should the strait disruptions tied to the conflict ease and oil tanker flows normalize, some economists expect global crude prices to soften, which would take pressure off South Africa’s import-heavy inflation basket and could give the SARB room to pause its tightening cycle later in the year. For now, the bank’s quarterly projection model has already been revised higher, with its 2026 and 2027 inflation forecasts lifted in May. Thursday’s decision will show whether policymakers believe June’s spike is a one-off tied to global oil markets or the start of a more persistent trend requiring sustained tightening.

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