BERLIN (Reuters) – Most Germans are worried about high inflation, and more than half of them report that rising prices are making them struggle financially, an international survey by Dynata showed.
According to the part of the survey dedicated to Germany, to which Reuters had access on Friday, 61% of German citizens are very or extremely concerned about rising prices for energy, food, gasoline and housing. Only 2% of the respondents said they were not concerned, and 37% were slightly or somewhat concerned.
German consumer prices, harmonised to compare with other European Union countries, rose by 9.2% on the year in January, preliminary data from the federal statistics office showed.
Out of those surveyed, 53% say that rising prices for everyday goods lead to financial difficulties.
The Global Consumer Trends Report showed that 39% of German citizens consider their financial situation worse than a year ago, while 41% said nothing had changed and only one in five said their financial situation had improved.
However, Germans were not very concerned about the labour market: The survey showed that a quarter of respondents were not worried at all about losing their job. This is in high contrast with the situation in other European countries – only 3% of those surveyed in Spain and 5% of the Italians had no worries about becoming unemployed.
The results of the survey reflect the resilience of the German labour market. Germany’s unemployment rate remained stable at 5.5% in January.
The study is based on responses from 11,000 consumers from the United States, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, China, Japan and Australia, who were surveyed between Jan. 5 and Jan. 10.
(Reporting by Reinhard Becker and Maria Martinez; Editing by Miranda Murray)