Government schemes that compensate workers for the loss of income while they are on short hours (known as short-time work compensation schemes) make it easier for employers to temporarily reduce hours worked so that labor is better matched to output requirements. Because the employers do not lay...

This article provides an overview of the economic literature on short-time work. It presents the main characteristics of short-time work since its emergence in Germany in the 1930s. It analyzes its effectiveness as a job preservation mechanism, drawing on theoretical models and empirical...

Many European labor markets are characterized by heavy employment protection taxes and the widespread use of fixed-duration contracts. The simultaneous use of these two policy instruments seems somewhat contradictory since the former primarily aims at limiting job destruction whereas the latter...