Kocher emphasized that short-time work is suitable for dealing with “short exogenous shocks”.
It was therefore correct that the Corona short-time work expired at the end of March. Corona short-time work has saved 1.3 million jobs in the past two years. It is justified where there have been closures or massive drops in sales. “But it shouldn’t cushion internal risks in companies,” said the minister.
Unemployment rate as in 2008
At the end of March, 161,000 employees were registered for short-time work. The general short-time work that can be applied for from April 1 is no longer so attractive for companies because 100 percent of the wage costs are no longer subsidized, but a deductible of 15 percent remains for the employer. The minimum work volume is defined as 50 percent and may be undershot if there is “particular economic justification”.
The unemployment rate in March was 6.3 percent nationwide. This is the lowest value since 2008, according to Kocher. 262,000 people were unemployed in March, and almost 74,000 were in training. Kocher did not go into the number of vacancies. Chamber of Commerce General Secretary Karlheinz Kopf pointed this out: More than 250,000 jobs can be found on the AMS job platform “allejobs”. Officially, companies have reported almost 124,000 vacancies to the labor market service. Every fourth job vacancy (31,248) was in Upper Austria – here the number of unemployed was 27,400, and almost 10,000 employable were in training.
The number of employees continues to rise – in Upper Austria to 695,000, which results in an unemployment rate of 3.8 percent for our state. (sib)
Source: Nachrichten
