In mid-January, the Austrian social insurance company published the latest December statistics on foreign workers working in Austria, Hungarian media reported, as quoted by Rador Radio Romania.

Ischgl, AustriaPhoto: dpa picture alliance / Alamy / Alamy / Profimedia

It is important to note that Österreichische Sozialversicherung only takes into account registered full-time employees.

In the last month of 2023, their number was 973,193, about ten thousand less than the 983,699 workers registered in November. Which is somewhat surprising, given that December is considered the peak season for very busy winter tourism in Austria.

However, year-on-year growth of around 5 percent has already been recorded, after only 929,739 foreign workers were registered on the Austrian labor market in December 2022.

As then, as this time, the largest number of foreign workers are German citizens: last month they were 127,559, and in November – 123,993.

How many Hungarians work in Austria?

But within one month, not only the number of German workers increased, but also the number of Hungarian citizens. In November, there were 118,930 Hungarian citizens in Austria, and in December their number increased to 123,032. This is an increase of 4,102 people, that is, an increase of almost 3.5 percent, writes Vilaggazdasag.

This situation is shocking, even if it was expected that the demand for work in the winter season in Austria would absorb the free labor force in Hungary. But while there was an exodus in Hungary, in December workers from the countries of the region, Slovaks, Poles, Romanians and even Slovenians, left Austria by the thousands.

In comparison, the Hungarian labor force is more than 123,000 people, which means that one in eight foreign workers employed full-time in the Austrian labor market is a Hungarian citizen. At the same time, the big picture also includes the fact that the jump in December is not unprecedented, as the same thing happened in 2022.

Then the number of Hungarians working in Austria increased by 4,029 people from November to December and reached 115,439 people. In other words, compared to December 2022, Austria in December 2023 became richer by 7,593 Hungarian workers compared to December 2022.