Berlin – The German Government expects to spend 93.6 billion euros (105 billion dollars) on refugees by 2020, a report said on Saturday.
Citing a draft document from the Finance Ministry, Der Spiegel magazine reported that the sum includes housing and integration costs as well as efforts to combat the refugee crisis by tackling its root causes.
The document is part of ongoing negotiations between the Federal Government and Germany’s 16 states over how to share the costs of supporting the refugees.
The calculations assume that 600,000 refugees will arrive in 2016, 400,000 in 2017 and 300,000 each year after that.
It also anticipates that 55 per cent of registered refugees will find work within five years of entering Germany.
Some one million asylum seekers registered in the country in 2015.
Germany’s statistics agency reported that increased government spending on migrants was one of the main drivers in first-quarter economic growth.
However, the mass influx has stoked populist resentment and causing a drop in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s public approval ratings.
The number of new arrivals has steadily declined in 2016. Some 16,000 asylum seekers were registered in April compared to 20,000 in March.
The number stood at 90,000 in January, according to the Interior Ministry.
Border closures in Balkan and Central European countries are said to be responsible for the downturn.
“By 2020, the Federal Government expects to have spent 5.7 billion euros on German language courses and another 4.6 billion euros on measures to help migrants get jobs.
“Some 25.7 billion euros is set to be spent on social welfare payments to refugees,” it stated (dpa/NAN)
