The Bundestag has given the green light to extend the short-time working regulations.
Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) said on Friday that thanks to short-time work, the labor market remained stable during the Corona crisis.
Over three million jobs have been secured.
This was expensive, but the right way.
The simplified access to short-time work will now run for another three months until the end of June 2022.
The government factions of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP voted in favor of this during the final consultation in the Bundestag.
The Union and the left also voted in favor, the AfD abstained.
The move is intended to cushion the economic consequences of the corona pandemic.
In order to receive short-time work benefits from the Federal Employment Agency (BA), it is therefore sufficient if at least one tenth of the employees are affected by a loss of work.
The increase in short-time work benefits from the fourth and seventh month will also be extended.
The maximum entitlement period is extended to 28 months.
The additional expenditure for the BA is estimated at 450 million euros in the draft law.
Heil said that short-time work could not continue forever.
There is hope that many companies will be in a better situation in the summer.
The federal and state governments also want to extend the fixed cost grants for companies until the end of June, as decided this week.
This should benefit companies that, despite the foreseeable easing of the pandemic, can still demonstrate a corona-related drop in sales of at least 30 percent.