The HWWI celebrated its Summer Party 2024 yesterday at the Grand Elysée Hamburg, where we enjoyed the reunion with our friends and sponsors, colleagues and partners from science, politics, business and society with delicacies from the grill and cool drinks.

After welcoming speeches by Ms. Christina Block and Senator Dr. Andreas Dressel, the Scientific Director of the HWWI, Prof. Dr. Michael Berlemann, presented the latest HWWI forecasts on the development of labor shortages to the guests and discussed the effects of possible solution strategies.

We would like to thank the Block family and the Gesellschaft der Freunde und Förderer e.V. for their support.

After a small gain in the first quarter of this year, the German economy suffered another slight setback in the second quarter. Overall, the German economy has been “bobbing around” without a clear direction since the beginning of 2022, after the coronavirus-related slump was made up for. Industry and the construction sector remain in crisis; investments are falling. Economic hopes are focused on private consumption. The real incomes of private households and thus their purchasing power have now risen noticeably again, although this has mainly been channelled into savings due to increased uncertainty. With a further increase in real income and a normalization of the propensity to save, private consumption should at least pick up. The Hamburg Institute of International Economics (HWWI) therefore continues to expect a slight recovery for the German economy in the remainder of 2024 and then again in 2025; economic growth is likely to average 0.2% in 2024 and 1% in 2025.

The aim of this study is to descriptively measure and present the progress made towards the defined goals of the “Hamburg 2040” strategy. By selecting and analyzing relevant indicators and comparing Hamburg with other federal states and regions, this report documents developments to date. Particular attention is paid to a North-South comparison, which makes it possible to analyze Hamburg’s reaction to the various crises over time and to make structural changes visible.

This article uses the HWWI-CGE model to investigate how large a drop in the hydrogen price would be as a result of supply shocks. The focus of the simulation is on northern Germany.