The labour market in Copenhagen is extremely strong, thanks to an economy supercharged by the success of Novo Nordisk's weight-loss medicines and the impact of more than a decade of restrictive immigration policies.
"I would say that Denmark has the best labour market in Europe, with positions available in every field," said Peter Karancsi, an advisor for Eures, the EU's employment service, based in Malmö.
"They have an aging population and they have also had strict migration laws for a long time," Karancsi told The Local.
What's the difference in the labour market?
The unemployment rate in Malmö hit 12.4 percent in June, according to the latest statistics from the Swedish Public Employment Service (Arbetsförmedlingen), while the unemployment rate in Denmark's capital region was at 3 percent. Not only are there a lot more jobs available on the Danish side of the Öresund, they also pay better, with the Danish krone currently 50 percent stronger than the Swedish krona.
READ ALSO: Foreign workers behind 'half' of record-breaking Danish employment figures
Has cross-border commuting increased?
About 23,175 people commuted over the bridge in the last three months of 2024, the most recent statistics in the Örestat database, and the cross-border business promotion agency Greater Copenhagen is aiming to increase that to 30,000 by 2030.
"It has increased quite a bit over the last few years in all sectors," Karancsi said. "Hospitality has been a big, big issue, the labour market for construction workers has been much better in Denmark. They need nurses, assistant nurses, and all kinds of healthcare workers."
"If you are motivated and have some kind of experience, you can get jobs in most sectors in Denmark. The industry they have with Novo Nordisk is very much affecting everything in Denmark, so life science specialists are valued as well. The problem is for them to find skilled professionals in most fields."
Looking at the statistics, the biggest employer of workers from Sweden is in the transportation and logistics sectors, followed by relatively high-skilled jobs in "professional, scientific, and technical services".
Where should you look for jobs if you want one?
Karancsi recommends looking for jobs in the same way that a Danish person would. This might mean using job portals such as Jobindex, Work in Denmark, and StepStone, or LinkedIn, which plays a crucial role in networking and job searching in Denmark.
It is normally not enough to simply apply, he said. In Denmark, you are rewarded for following up applications with messages sent to the person responsible for advertising the job.
"You have to email the contact person in the job vacancy to show your interest in a more proactive way. That's one of the starting points," he said.
READ ALSO: How foreigners in Denmark got their jobs
But he also recommended sending in unsolicited applications to companies you are interested in working for, even if they do not currently have suitable roles advertised. In Denmark, this is called an uopfordret ansøgning, or "unsolicited application" and is sufficiently common that some Danish companies even have a part of their recruitment site where people can put themselves forward in this way.
What language should you apply in?
For corporate jobs with big multinationals where English is the working language, you should obviously apply in English. But Karancsi said some smaller companies, say in the hotel and restaurant industry, healthcare, or construction, might look more favourably at an application sent in Swedish.
"If they can get somebody from Sweden who can understand Danish after a short time, that's the second best option for them, as you can also carry out your work in an understandable Scandinavian, Danish, Swedish mix. They see it as an advantage to hire somebody with the ability of integrating with the rest of the team in Swedish, and then understanding Danish after a little while."
What are the barriers for foreign workers?
For EU citizens, there are few if any barriers to taking a job on the other side of the Öresund.
Non-EU citizens, even those with permanent residency in Sweden, still need a Danish work permit. This basically requires you to either be applying for a role on the so-called 'positive list' of in-demand professions, or one which pays 514,000 kroner a year, enough to quality for the Pay Limit Scheme.
The Danish government has recently proposed that citizens of 16 countries, including the USA, the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada, should be eligible for work permits even if their job only pays 300,000 kroner a year.
The other countries are Singapore, China, Japan, India, Brazil, Malaysia, Montenegro, Serbia, North Macedonia, Albania, Ukraine, and Moldova.
Swedish residents working in Denmark pay income tax in Denmark, which can be complicated.
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