Record number of German employees on reduced working hours

Source: Xinhua | 2020-06-03

About 7.3 million employees in Germany were on short-time work in May, according to a business survey published by the ifo Institute on Tuesday.

"This number has never been so high" in Germany, said ifo labor market expert Sebastian Link. "During the financial crisis, short-time work peaked in May 2009 with just under 1.5 million people affected."

German companies had already registered 10.1 million employees for short-time work with the Federal Employment Agency (BA) in March and April. However, only 71 percent of the employees were in fact working short time, according to ifo estimates.

In business-related services such as transport and warehousing, hospitality as well as the information and communication sector, 2.4 million employees worked short-time, accounting for 24.5 percent of the total German workforce, according to the ifo.

In Germany's manufacturing sector, the number of employees working short-time was at 2.2 million. In the trade sector, the number of employees working short-time was at 1.3 million, according to ifo.

"In contrast to the financial crisis, when over 80 percent of employees on short-time work were in manufacturing, during the coronavirus crisis short-time work is being applied in almost all economic sectors," ifo noted.

On the other hand, the number of employees on short-time work was "particularly low" in the building and underground construction industry, with almost 22,000 people, or 4.1 percent of the workforce affected, ifo noted.

On Wednesday, Germany's Federal Employment Agency is scheduled to announce the labor market statistics for May.