Climate crisis seen as low priority for German employees, study finds

Concern about the climate crisis plays only a minor role for employees in Germany, according to a study published on Saturday.

The survey found that only about one in ten employees consider achieving climate protection targets to be the most pressing current social issue.

The survey was conducted by the Wittenberg Centre for Global Ethics (WZGE) on behalf of the corporate foundation of the energy company Eon.

The findings suggest that other social challenges are moving up the agenda in the minds of employees.

These include reducing social inequality (17%), securing jobs (15%) and resolving geopolitical conflicts (14%).

"People are looking more at economic sustainability and less at environmental sustainability," the authors of the survey write.

In 2025, the proportion of respondents who identified "securing competitiveness" as the most pressing social issue tripled compared to 2022.

Nevertheless, there is still a large majority in favour of maintaining or at least continuing the pace of climate-neutral industrial transformation.

Just under half believe that more speed is needed, while a further 30% consider the current pace to be sufficient. One in five respondents said that the transformation should be slowed down.

"People see climate neutrality as an opportunity for the economy and not as an obstacle," said WZGE head Martin von Broock. "That's why they are calling on politicians to provide better incentives instead of reducing their efforts."

This is the third time the WZGE has conducted the survey. More than 2,000 current and future employees were surveyed online in February 2025.