By Tom Fairless

Around 470,000 German businesses asked staff to work shorter hours in March, a record high, underscoring the destructive impact of the coronavirus on Europe's largest economy.

It wasn't immediately clear how many German workers would be affected. But Detlef Scheele, chairman of the German Labor Agency, said the number of workers on state-subsidized short-time work schemes would likely rise considerably higher than its peak during the 2008-09 financial crisis, when 1.4 million workers took advantage of the program.

Requests came from almost all sectors of the economy, the labor agency said. That marks a change from the financial crisis, which hit the manufacturing sector particularly hard.

The labor agency said it had appointed an additional 4,000 staff to process short-time work requests, and 14,000 extra staff to handle telephone inquiries. It has also requested an additional 10 billion euros ($11.06 billion) in funding from Germany's Labor Ministry, Mr. Scheele said.

Write to Tom Fairless at tom.fairless@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 31, 2020 10:18 ET (14:18 GMT)