The German economy is hard hit by the corona crisis. The Federal Employment Agency has now published unemployment figures that show the extent.
- The corona crisis * hits the German economy hard.
- Like many other German companies, the car maker BMW is in a crisis ( see first report on May 29 ).
- The employment agency is now publishing terrifying unemployment figures.
Update from June 3, 10:52 am: The corona crisis in Germany is now evident in the number of unemployed. The unemployment rate climbed in May by 0.3 points to 6.1 percent, said Federal agency for work with (3 June) on Wednesday. Compared to April, the number of unemployed rose by 169,000 to 2.813 million people.
A look at the past year also shows the extent: compared to May 2019, unemployment rose by 577,000 people.
The Federal Employment Agency is also expecting six million short-time workers in April due to the Corona crisis . The Federal Agency's reserve of EUR 26 billion will probably not be sufficient to finance it, said Detlef Scheele, CEO of the Federal Agency . The loss of working hours for short-time workers is estimated to be 50 percent on average, which is higher than in previous crises.
Corona crisis: BMW wants quick job cuts - "Previous decisions are not enough"
First report from May 29th:
Munich - BMW wants to accelerate job cuts in the Group . The board of directors is currently negotiating with the works council on how to cut around 6,000 of the 126,000 jobs worldwide as soon as possible without redundancies . On Friday, CFO Nicolas Peter said on request: "The decisions made so far are not sufficient to steer the BMW Group in the best possible way through this enormously difficult situation." we cannot avoid taking further action now ”.
Corona crisis: BMW wants to achieve savings without redundancies
Now it is being considered whether to send employees to retire two or three years before the statutory retirement age with a settlement earlier. The approximately 800 trainees who are about to finish are to be taken on . However, young employees should be able to take time off to study or qualify with the guarantee that they will then be able to work again at BMW. Instead of vacation pay, there should be more vacation days, 40-hour contracts should be reduced to 35 hours.
BMW plans to cut jobs due to the Corona crisis. If possible, however, this should happen without operational redundancies.
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"Our goal is to adopt a package in June, " said Horstmeier. Usually around 5,000 employees leave the car company every year, half of them retire. Any vacancies that are vacant will be checked in each individual case. In the recession, however, fewer employees move to other companies than in normal times.
Corona crisis: BMW expects losses like other car manufacturers in the current quarter
In the current quarter, BMW expects as VW and Daimler at a loss . Sales are poor, the plants work in one shift. CEO Oliver Zipse said at the Annual General Meeting in mid-May: "The forecasts for 2020 are bleak ." Furthermore, BMW works council chief Manfred Schoch no longer ruled out layoffs due to operational reasons. A company agreement guarantees every employee his or her job - but only as long as the company generates an annual profit.
In addition to car manufacturers, Lufthansa is also in crisis. A planned government bailout is now being delayed. The airline has initially rejected the government's deal because of related demands from the EU Commission. Incidentally , BMW is also demanding government support . A few days ago, however, the large corporation caused outrage by distributing costly dividends to shareholders.
In Germany, students could wave lessons in clubhouses or exhibition halls after the summer holidays.
dpa / cia
* Merkur.de is part of the nationwide Ippen-Digital editors network.