Sometimes the reason a company can't find staff is that almost nobody is willing to accept the salary they offer.

This. Shortages are mostly in jobs that suck like gastronomy or hard labor like warehouse work or in jobs that are highly niche and skilled like Doctors or scientists.

Well paying jobs that are easy to do have no shortages, in fact, you never see them advertised as they are usually quickly filled via internal hires or direct referrals.

Staff shortages in Germany usually are salary shortages, i.e. companies could easily hire more staff if they would double the pay but they won't.

For example, entry level salary for software developers is virtually the same as 10 years ago despite the crazy increase in cost of living.

Because more people are retiring than are finishing school. The baby boomers are the largest post-war generation in Germany, and that's coming back to bite us.

Most importantly, companies aren't used to the employment market being a seller's market, so they're not willing to pay competitive rates for new hires.

As result, no one's willing to do 3 years badly paid training (Ausbildung) just to earn below-average wage in a dead-end job.

...lots of people do Ausbildung, and it's a great way to get a steady permanent career with an automatic payrise. A lot of people in other first world countries would kill for such stability.

That may have been true before the pandemic and the self inflicted economic suicide committed by a Germany that has been fully transmuted into a US vasall state.

Even the Syrian refugees who came here in 2015-2016 are already looking for new jobs elsewhere. Most of the people in my surroundings who aren't following mainstream media anymore have either moved to other countries or are planning to do so.

Germany is done. Looks like the US is finally getting their Morgentau.

"a lot" doesn't mean anything if not compared to something, there are 200.000 less youths doing ausbilundg compared to 10years ago and 500.000 less than when it was at its top ~1980. And it will decline if we keep pretending...

I fully agree, but with how low the birthrates have been, even if 100% of young people choose an Ausbildung, there's not enough Fachkräfte for every open job. And employers aren't willing to enter the bidding war required to get the people they need.