Germany opens labour market to highly-skilled professionals

The German parliament has passed a bill to implement the EU Directive for Highly Skilled Migrants. This means that from August 1st 2012, Citizens of non-EU states will be able to enter and reside in Germany in order to carry out a highly skilled occupation.
The new legislation introduces the EU Blue Card scheme which requires potential applicants to have a university degree and a gross annual salary of at least 44,800 euros. In occupations where there are particular skill shortages (currently engineers, ICT specialists and medical practitioners) this salary threshold drops to 34,944 euros. Priority reviews are no longer necessary in either case.

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