European Policy Analysis Volume 2, Number 2, Winter 2016 | Page 128

European Policy Analysis
have other qualifications , but that he did not care for those .
I act according to the references that they had themselves , because those are closer and linked to the work , than any papers saying what someone has done so far , there are differences . I do not care if a paper is provided that she is an examined nurse , but she does not know how to organize the main daily routine . ( Head of a German agency for live-ins )
This is in line with the previous statement on how in the informant ’ s explanation Eastern European women are more caring and more willing to do this kind of work compared to German women . What is expected of the live-ins is not called “ qualified ” work necessarily , in the way the agencies portray the tasks . It is domestic work and includes “ traditional women ’ s tasks ”. In this way one could argue that it is not only the case that processes of emancipation influence live-in employment but also vice versa . Some of the mainly female workers have higher qualifications , sometimes related to the sector , sometimes on other fields . During live-in employments , these other qualifications are unused which constitutes an inability for the live-ins to build a career and a consequent loss of human capital .
In the earlier part on circular migration in practice , the differentiation between private and professional lives of live-ins has already been explained , but what are the implications of this spatial separation of private and professional lives ? The head of an agency in Germany explained , that in the frame of the freedom to provide services within the EU , an around-the-clock service was possible . This shows that in these arrangements the live-ins do not have time for their private lives while they are employed in Germany . Knowing this , the question arises whether the separation into private and professional spheres is not the basis of this intense 24-hours care arrangement . Because of limitations in time , live-ins are prevented from building a private life while they stay with families in Germany . In order to have private lives , they have to go back to their countries of origin , which results in this rotation system built on the circularity of the employees .
Live-ins as a Sub Sector Within Elderly Care in Germany
The interviews with elderly homes and outpatient care institutions indicated that while the subsector of live-ins is mainly occupied by migrants , migration does only play a marginal role in other care intuitions of the sector .
One informant explained difficulties in recruitment and the frustrations on the side of the employers .
That is really not an easy task , not an easy area , and to be honest , many of the German employers are frustrated by now , they get 40 people from somewhere and five or seven stay in the end .
( Press officer of an employer ’ s association )
One of the main reasons why the recruitment costs are high and linked to a high risk for elderly care homes and outpatient care is that the training of nurses and their subsequent tasks are organized very differently in other countries . While in Germany there are two separate vocational trainings for nurses in the health care system and nurses in elderly care , in most other countries nurses have an academic training . This leads to
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