More than half of Austria’s bigger companies are said to be considering moving their business abroad, according to a new study.
Polling institute Hajek conducted a representative survey of managers of Austrian companies with more than 100 employees for the “Infrastructure Report 2025”, presented on November 7 in Vienna by lobbying organisation Future Business Austria.
According to the report, 39 per cent of managers are considering moving parts of their companies out of Austria. A further 17 per cent are mulling relocating entirely.
“The need for action is enormous. Austria is in recession for the second year in a row for the first time since 1945,” said David Ungar-Klein, one of the authors of the study.
The main reasons cited were excessive taxation (mentioned by 57 per cent of respondents), a shortage of qualified labour (41 per cent), high energy prices (34 per cent), rising prices in general (33 per cent) and excessive bureaucracy (30 per cent).
Managers also lamented a what they said was a drastic decline in motivation among their employees, while 57 per cent said their employees’ commitment to work had fallen in the past year. Only 7 per cent said they saw an improvement.
The results of the survey went hand in hand with a deterioration of Austria’s economic competitiveness over the past few years.
In the 2024 World Competitiveness Rating by Swiss university IMD, the country slid two places and is now ranked 26 out of 67 economies – far behind the leading nations Singapore, Switzerland, Denmark, as well as Germany (24). It is just above Indonesia (27) and the UK (28). In 2020, Austria was ranked at 16 but has fallen continuously ever since.
The World Competitiveness Rating ranks countries based on many different economic indicators. Austria does especially poorly in the field of government efficiency where it has dropped from 25 to 40 place in the past four years.
These numbers represent a poor report card for the coalition government of Conservatives (ÖVP) and Greens, which has ruled Austria since 2020. Both parties were heavily punished by the voters in the general election on September 29, 2024. Their combined share of the vote tumbled from 61 per cent to 34 per cent, the biggest loss for a government in Austria’s post-war history.
The ÖVP and the Socialist Party are currently in coalition talks with the Greens as a potential third member.
