On 21 October the Slovak government approved a draft short-time work concept to be introduced in Slovakia, which is expected to come into force as of 1 January 2022. The short-time work scheme inspired by German “Kurzarbeitergeld” should allow employers, which must temporarily limit their operations due to adverse external factors, to temporarily reduce working time of their employees. At the same time the state would participate in compensation for the loss of the employees’ income due to the reduced working time via state allowance provided from the state social security scheme. The short-time work bill should be submitted to the Slovak government by the end of this year, and its approval by the Slovak Parliament is expected in the first quarter of 2021. This new scheme shall not be confused with the currently applicable temporary support scheme “First Aid”, which was introduced due to the current pandemic, and which is also referred to as “Kurzarbeit”. More details are available here: