Germany

Research institutions in Germany include the Max Planck Society, the Helmholtz Association, the Fraunhofer Society and the Leibniz Association. The Wendelstein 7-X in Greifswald hosts a facility in the research of fusion power for instance.[196] The Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize is granted to ten scientists and academics every year. With a maximum of €2.5 million per award it is one of the highest endowed research prizes in the world.[197]

Tourism

Germany is the seventh most visited country in the world,[198] with a total of 407 million overnights during 2012.[199] This number includes 68.83 million nights by foreign visitors. In 2012, over 30.4 million international tourists arrived in Germany. Berlin has become the third most visited city destination in Europe.[200] Additionally, more than 30% of Germans spend their holiday in their own country, with the biggest share going to Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Domestic and international travel and tourism combined directly contribute over EUR43.2 billion to German GDP. Including indirect and induced impacts, the industry contributes 4.5% of German GDP and supports 2 million jobs (4.8% of total employment).[201]

Germany is well known for its diverse tourist routes, such as the Romantic Road, the Wine Route, the Castle Road, and the Avenue Road. The German Timber-Frame Road (Deutsche Fachwerkstraße) connects towns with examples of these structures.[202][203]

Germany's most visited and popular landmarks include Neuschwanstein Castle, Cologne Cathedral, the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, Hofbräuhaus Munich, Heidelberg Castle, Dresden Zwinger, Fernsehturm Berlin, the Walhalla memorial, and Aachen Cathedral. The Europa-Park near Freiburg is Europe's second most popular theme park resort.[204]

With a population of 80.2 million according to the 2011 census,[206] rising to at least 81.9 million as of 31 December 2015[update],[207] Germany is the most populous country in the European Union, the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the 16th most populous country in the world.[208] Its population density stands at 227 inhabitants per square kilometre (588 per square mile). The overall life expectancy in Germany at birth is 80.19 years (77.93 years for males and 82.58 years for females).[100] The fertility rate of 1.41 children born per woman (2011 estimates), below the replacement rate of 2.1, it remains considerably below the high of 5.28 children born per woman in 1884,[209] or 8.33 births per 1000 inhabitants, is one of the lowest fertility rates in the world.[100] Since the 1970s, Germany's death rate has exceeded its birth rate.[210] However, Germany is witnessing increased birth rates and migration rates since the beginning of the 2010s,[211] particularly a rise in the number of well-educated migrants.[212][213] Germany has the 3rd oldest population in the world, with the average age of 47.4 years.[214]

Four sizeable groups of people are referred to as "national minorities" because their ancestors have lived in their respective regions for centuries:[215] There is a Danish minority (about 50,000) in the northernmost state of Schleswig-Holstein;[215] the Sorbs, a Slavic population of about 60,000, are in the Lusatia region of Saxony and Brandenburg.; the Roma and Sinti live throughout the country; and the Frisians are concentrated in Schleswig-Holstein's western coast and in the north-western part of Lower Saxony.[215]

Approximately 5 million Germans live abroad (Auslandsdeutsche).[216]

Immigrant population

After the United States, Germany is the second most popular immigration destination in the world.[217][218] As of 2016[update], about ten million of Germany's 82 million residents did not have German citizenship, which makes up 12% of the country's population.[219] The majority of migrants live in western Germany, in particular in urban areas.[220][221]

The Federal Statistical Office classifies the citizens by immigrant background. Regarding the immigrant background, 22.5% of the country's residents, or more than 18.6 million people, were of immigrant or partially immigrant descent in 2016 (including persons descending or partially descending from ethnic German repatriates).[223] In 2015, 36% of children under 5 were of immigrant or partially immigrant descent.[224]

In the 2011 census, the designation "people with a migrant (or: migration) background"[225] (Personen mit Migrationshintergrund) was used for all immigrants, including ethnic Germans that came to the federal republic or had at least one parent that settled there after 1955. The largest share of people with a migrant background consists of returning ethnic Germans (Aussiedler and Spätaussiedler), followed by Turkish, European Union, and former Yugoslav citizens.[226]

In the 1960s and 1970s, the German governments invited "guest workers" (Gastarbeiter) to migrate to Germany for work in the German industries. Many companies preferred to keep these workers employed in Germany after they had trained them and Germany's immigrant population has steadily increased.[206]

In 2015, the Population Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs listed Germany as host to the second-highest number of international migrants worldwide, about 5% or 12 million of all 244 million migrants.[227] Germany ranks 7th amongst EU countries and 37th globally in terms of the percentage of migrants who made up part of the country's population. As of 2014[update], the largest national group was from Turkey (2,859,000), followed by Poland (1,617,000), Russia (1,188,000), and Italy (764,000).[228] 740,000 people have African origins, an increase of 46% since 2011.[223] Since 1987, around 3 million ethnic Germans, mostly from the former Eastern Bloc countries, have exercised their right of return and emigrated to Germany.[229]

Religion

Upon its establishment in 1871, Germany was about two-thirds Protestant[i] and one-third Roman Catholic, with a notable Jewish minority. Other faiths existed in the state, but never achieved a demographic significance and cultural impact of these three confessions. Germany lost nearly all of its Jewish minority during the Holocaust. Religious makeup changed gradually in the decades following 1945, with West Germany becoming more religiously diversified through immigration and East Germany becoming overwhelmingly irreligious through state policies. It continues to diversify after the German reunification in 1990, with an accompanying substantial decline in religiosity throughout all of Germany and a contrasting increase of evangelical Protestants and Muslims.[230]

Geographically, Protestantism is concentrated in the northern, central and eastern parts of the country.[j] These are mostly members of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD), which encompasses Lutheran, Reformed and administrative or confessional unions of both traditions dating back to the Prussian Union of 1817.[k] Roman Catholicism is concentrated in the south and west.

The 2011 German Census showed Christianity as the largest religion in Germany, with 64.2% of the total population registering themselves as members of a legally-recognized church.[231] Relative to the whole population, 31.7% declared themselves as Protestants, including members of the Evangelical Church in Germany (30.8%) and the free churches (German: Evangelische Freikirchen) (0.9%), 31.2% declared themselves as Roman Catholics, Orthodox believers constituted 1.3%, and other religions accounted for 2.7%.[231] A total of 66.8% identified themselves as Christian, with 3.8% of those not being church members.[232]

According to data from 2016, the Catholic Church and the Evangelical Church claimed 28.5% and 27.5%, respectively, of the population.[233][234] Both large churches have lost significant numbers of adherents in recent years.

According to the 2011 census, 33% of Germans were not members of a public-law religious organization entitled to collect church tax,[231][l] mainly the Christian churches. 10.5% of the population indicated that they did not have any religious beliefs, with this being up to 33% in the east; 5.3% indicated other religious affiliations, and 17.4% gave no answer.[232] A study in 2018 estimated that 38% of the population are not members of any religious organization or denomination,[4] though up to a third may still consider themselves religious.[236] Irreligion in Germany is strongest in the former East Germany, which used to be predominantly Protestant before state atheism, and in major metropolitan areas.[237][238]

Islam is the second largest religion in the country.[231] In the 2011 census, 1.9% of the census population (1.52 million people) gave their religion as Islam, but this figure is deemed unreliable because a disproportionate number of adherents of this religion (and other religions, such as Judaism) are likely to have made use of their right not to answer the question.[239] Figures from Religionswissenschaftlicher Medien- und Informationsdienst suggest a figure of 4.4 to 4.7 million (around 5.5% of the population) in 2015.[5] A study conducted by the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees found that between 2011 and 2015 the Muslim population rose by 1.2 million people, mostly due to immigration.[240] Most of the Muslims are Sunnis and Alevites from Turkey, but there are a small number of Shi'ites, Ahmadiyyas and other denominations.[241]

Other religions comprising less than one per cent of Germany's population[231] include Buddhism with 270,000 adherents, Judaism with 200,000 adherents, and Hinduism with some 100,000 adherents. All other religious communities in Germany have fewer than 50,000 adherents each.[242]