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The renewed lockdown is hitting many industries hard, but overall the German labor market is still getting through the Corona crisis well.

A good 2.7 million people were unemployed in November.

This is still significantly more than a year ago (plus 519,000), but the number fell more than usual for the time of year.

The unemployment rate fell by 0.1 percentage points to 5.9 percent.

"That is good news for the circumstances," said Detlef Scheele, head of the Federal Employment Agency (BA), at the authority's monthly press conference.

The number of short-time workers also fell continuously, in September it was 2.2 million according to extrapolation.

More short-time work, especially in hotels

In November, the number of short-time working notices rose significantly again as a result of the closings in some industries, such as the hospitality and cultural sectors.

By November 25, the companies registered short-time work for 537,000 employees.

However, it is always only with a delay how many employees actually work less;

some companies only show short-time working as a precaution.

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The Munich Ifo Institute had previously reported that the proportion of companies with short-time work had increased from around 25 percent in October to 28 percent in November.

The basis is a survey of 7,000 companies.

In the hotel business in particular, the proportion rose significantly, from almost 63 to 91 percent.

But Scheele does not assume that "something is getting completely out of hand".

On the contrary: the numbers will remain well below the record level of almost six million short-time workers at the beginning of the pandemic.

“There has not been a large wave of layoffs to this day,” said Scheele.

"That would not have been possible without short-time work."

Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) also emphasized this.

Despite the massive shock, "the great quake in the German labor market failed to materialize" - and the most important instrument in this is short-time work.

"Mass unemployment would be much more expensive for our country," said Heil.

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Despite all the hardships, there is reason for "realistic confidence".

Compared to all other countries, Germany is doing very well.

Germany's unemployment rate below the EU average

Holger Schäfer from the Institut der Deutschen Wirtschaft (IW) also shares the positive assessment.

“Germany got off very lightly.

The German job market has shown itself to be surprisingly robust, ”said the economist.

“It could also have been that the situation deteriorated significantly again in November because of the new lockdown.

But there are only a few effects. "

Schäfer points out that the sharp rise in unemployment was limited to spring and then subsided again.

That went much worse in some other countries.

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Data from the Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat) are often used for international comparisons.

The core figure - the unemployment rate - differs from the national unemployment rates.

For Germany it was 4.5 percent in September, and 8.3 percent in the euro zone.

In order to be able to assess how Germany fared in the crisis, however, a look at the development since the time before the corona pandemic is more meaningful.

According to Eurostat data, the unemployment rate has increased by 0.9 percentage points since February and only slightly more in the euro area (plus 1.0 percentage point).

Individual countries fared significantly worse, for example Spain (plus 2.9 percentage points) and the Netherlands (plus 1.5 percentage points).

However, in this comparison there are also countries that show a better development than the Federal Republic.

This includes Poland, for example (plus 0.1 percentage points).

Enzo Weber from the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) of the BA points out that the first wave of the pandemic was weaker in many Eastern European countries than in Germany.

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Source: WORLD

And he says: "In the Corona crisis, many states took the good experiences of the Federal Republic of Germany in the 2008/2009 financial crisis as an example." At that time, Germany was still the prime example of the use of short-time working, this time significantly more states are using it in a similar way Scope.

His conclusion: Germany is getting through the crisis well - but so are other countries.

There was a lot of short-time working in France, for example.

According to Eurostat, the unemployment rate here rose by 0.2 percentage points from February to September.

However, the unemployment rate does not reflect the whole picture, says Weber: “During the crisis, many people in Europe withdrew completely from the labor market.

You then count as neither employed nor unemployed. "

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The crisis costs are enormous, however.

The expenses for short-time working as a result of the corona pandemic have now risen to more than 20 billion euros.

More than half of this was accounted for by payments to employees who had to accept reduced wages due to the forced break, reports the Reuters agency.

Around 8.7 billion euros were paid to employers as reimbursement for social contributions.

The BA assumes that it will have a deficit of 27 billion euros by the end of the year.

Around 20 billion will be financed from the reserve, the rest from federal funds.

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Source: WORLD / Max Hermes

The exact effects of the new lockdown will only be shown in figures next year.

The unemployment count day fell on November 11th, only nine days since the restrictions began.

However, IAB expert Weber expects the labor market to remain robust, as the effects are not as serious as in spring.

Aid for companies also contributes to this.