Job situation during the Corona crisis Unemployment in Bonn and the region rises sharply
Bonn · Companies in Bonn and the Rhine-Sieg district have registered for a temporary reduction in working hours for more than 76,000 employees and in this way are trying to keep their staff during the corona crisis. Only few employers are currently creating new jobs.
The corona crisis is not only affecting the job market nationwide, but also in the Bonn/Rhine-Sieg region. Compared to the same month last year, the number of unemployed rose by 4,548 persons or 17.7 percent in April. The unemployment rate in the region rose in April by 0.8 percent compared to the previous year (6.1 percent). This is 0.6 percent more than in March.
"The strong increase in the number of reported “Kurzarbeit” (cases of workers receiving temporary reduction in working hours) is encouraging, which shows that many companies want to keep their employees", says Stefan Krause, Chairman of the Management Board of the Bonn/Rhine-Sieg Employment Agency.
In March and April a total of 7,564 companies in the Bonn/Rhine-Sieg region applied for “Kurzarbeit”. In the previous year, only 14 companies did so for the months of March and April. The Employment Agency had listed 76,298 people for whom “Kurzarbeit” was planned for March and April.
Whether all of these people will actually be affected by a temporary reduction in working hours will only become apparent after some time: Companies will only provide information as to whether the reduction of hours has actually occurred when the accounts are settled in one of the following three months. For procedural reasons, the Employment Agency waits five months until the statistics are collected.
The demand for skilled workers has also fallen sharply in the region. Employers' uncertainty about their economic prospects is reflected in the fact that they reported fewer job openings to the Employment Agency. Compared to the same month last year, the number of registered job vacancies fell by 24 percent to a total of 5,922. That was 86 jobs less than in the previous month. The number of new jobs fell by 379 compared to the previous month. That was a decrease of 25.7 percent. The decline, however, remained moderate compared to the rest of NRW.
In NRW, 151,829 companies put employees on reduced working hours in March and April, affecting 2.15 million workers. Compared to the previous month, unemployment rose by 69,846 registered unemployed to 718,033 persons. This was the strongest increase in one month since February 2005.
"Without the successfully implemented labor market instrument of “Kurzarbeit”, unemployment could have affected many more people. For that reason, it was the right thing to ease the terms for “Kurzarbeit” so that more companies could take advantage of it," said Torsten Withake, Chairman of the Management Board of the NRW Regional Directorate of the Federal Employment Agency on Thursday at an online press conference.
By way of comparison: In the entire year of the financial and economic crisis of 2009, a total of 28,663 companies and businesses introduced reduced working hours, affecting 676,306 employees at the time.
Withake cited the absence of the spring revival as an important reason for the rise in unemployment: "Employers usually hire new staff in spring. This has failed to happen this year." For example, the number of people who were able to find a job in April was 14,287 or about 34 per cent lower than in the previous month.
Orig. text: Claudia Mahnke
Translation: ck