This is world-wide, not just in the automotive industry. The US military has the same problem. The Navy has submarines sitting in port unable to go to sea because they don't have enough mechanics to run or repair them. When I was in the Navy, we were being assigned more than 24hrs of work per day. Management knew it wasn't being completed and they were falsifying nuclear engineering maintenance records, sweeping it straight under the rug. In a time when all other jobs lost their bonuses or started force-retiring people, we were being offered near-six-figure bonuses to re-enlist for two more years. If you played it right you could get it tax-free and it would almost double your take-home compensation. And we were all turning them down because the job was so horrible. After I got out of the military I worked in mechanical engineering in several different industries before switching to software. Most of the best mechanics I knew switched to software.