Record female power: almost half of Germans work part-time!

Record female power: almost half of Germans work part-time!

The trend towards part-time work is booming in Germany, and the numbers speak for themselves. Loud Deutschlandfunk 29 percent of employed people aged 15 to 64 now work part-time. This puts Germany in a high place in the EU; only in the Netherlands and Austria are the part-time proportions even more pronounced. The gender difference is particularly striking: While 48 percent of women in Germany work part-time, only 12 percent of men do so.

Despite this high part-time rate, the average weekly working time in Germany is 34.8 hours, significantly lower than the EU average of 37.1 hours. The
However, the employment rate, i.e. the proportion of employed people in the age group, is a record high: at 77 percent, it is above the EU average of 71 percent. The proportion of women in employment is also impressive, at 74 percent, which is eight percentage points above the European average.

Part-time in European comparison

A look at the European landscape shows that the part-time rate in Germany is the third highest in the EU, followed by the Netherlands (43 percent) and Austria (31 percent). Daily Mirror reported. Across the EU, the part-time rate is 18 percent, which underlines the importance of flexible working models in Germany. While working hours have decreased slightly in Germany and across the EU over the last ten years, pressure is increasing on the government to secure economic stability through longer working hours. These developments are leading to increasing calls for a maximum weekly working time, which, however, is encountering resistance from unions.

If you look back, half of employed women were already working part-time in 2018. This type of employment is particularly common in low-paid service jobs, while it is rare in industrial sectors. According to an analysis by bpb Part-time employees are mostly women who work part-time due to family or childcare needs. This is much less common for men, at just 4 percent.

Advantages and challenges of part-time work

Part-time work offers many advantages, especially when it comes to balancing work and private life. But the other side of the coin cannot be ignored. Low working hours can lead to the beginning of the “part-time trap” phenomenon, where employees remain on the periphery of the labor market and have few opportunities to increase their hours. This poses the risk of falling incomes and fewer opportunities for advancement. In addition, only 9 percent of people working part-time have management positions.

The legislative framework should also not be ignored. The legal right to bridge part-time work, which was introduced in 2019, is intended to help promote the flexibility of part-time work.
But given the frequent uncertainties and the underrepresentation of women in leadership positions, it remains to be seen how the part-time market will develop further. The federal government is called upon to offer suitable working time models in order to further improve the compatibility of work and family, in order not only to increase the numbers, but also to improve the quality of life of employees.