Immigrants Now Make Up 15% of Helsinki’s Municipal Workforce

The City of Helsinki is seeing a sharp increase in foreign-background employees across its municipal workforce. Nearly 6,000 of the city’s 40,000 workers in 2023 came from an international background.

The local government is currently Finland’s largest single employer. This municipal workforce growth reflects broader demographic shifts happening across the country.

Finland is experiencing a rapidly shrinking native working-age population. National birth rates have reached historic lows while the rate of retirement continues to accelerate.

Municipalities are relying on international recruitment to staff essential public services. The share of foreign-background city workers has grown steadily since 2010 to fill these labor gaps.

Pasi Saukkonen, a special researcher for the city, tole the national broadcaster Yle that this demographic shift in the workforce has been especially strong since 2017.

The proportion of international municipal staff still lags behind general population demographics. Over 22 percent of Helsinki residents aged between 20 and 64 had a foreign background at the end of 2023.

The highest concentration of international employees is found in the care and healthcare sectors. About one in five workers in these fields has a foreign background.

Helsinki has adapted its hiring practices to accommodate non-native speakers. Roughly 11.5 percent of city employees spoke a language other than Finnish or Swedish as their mother tongue by late 2025.

Certain medical professions still maintain strict language rules despite general municipal flexibility. Doctors and nurses must meet legally defined language requirements to practice in Finland.

The city workforce also remains highly segregated by gender. Nearly 80 percent of all municipal employees were women in 2023. Over half of these women work in health and social services.