Against the background of a renewed increase in the number of short-time workers, the chairwoman of the Federal Employment Agency, Andrea Nahles, has suggested a new instrument to supplement the previous short-time allowance.

"From our point of view, it would still be right to develop a short-time work allowance," said Nahles of the German Press Agency. According to them, such an instrument could include simplified payment procedures, flat-rate amounts and reduced verification obligations.

The short-time allowance as an emergency intervention had recently proven its worth, especially during the corona pandemic, when up to six million people received corresponding payments from the Federal Employment Agency. Short-time work had then gradually decreased again since the peak in April 2020. Most recently, however, the Nuremberg statisticians determined that the numbers had doubled from August to September - apparently in connection with the most recent crisis involving energy prices and inflation. Among other things, because higher payments are expected next year, the Federal Agency has corrected its budget again upwards by 350 million euros.

According to Nahles, in the course of handling the Corona crisis, the authority had employed up to 2,400 employees exclusively to check applications for short-time work benefits. The tests would have lasted until 2024 if the legislature had not brought about a simplification. "A good 75 percent of the applications were without objection, in four percent of the cases we had to pay money," said Nahles. The effort was not justified.

"The economic short-time allowance is only a limited instrument for long, comprehensive and cross-industry crises because it is very complex in administration," said Nahles. It would make sense for any new times of crisis to have a simplified concept. "I would at least like to have it in the drawer," said Nahles. You can activate it as needed.