European Restructuring Monitor (ERM)
Eurofound's ERM database on restructuring-related legal regulations provides information on regulations in the Member States of the European Union and Norway which are explicitly or implicitly linked to anticipating and managing change.
Case law only; applicable to establishments and workers covered by article 1 of the Employment Protection Act (Kündigungsschutzgesetz)
Following labour court rulings (see sources below), workers hold the right of reemployment if they are covered by the Employment Protection Act (Kündigungsschutzgesetz, KSchG) and if it can be shown that he/she was dismissed on grounds of wrong or outdated projections of future business developments. Workers have to file complaints for reemployment within the statutory time of dismissal protection (up to seven months depending on the tenure). The regulations only apply to employers employing more than 10 workers and to workers who have worked for the establishment for more than six months.
The right of reemployment is only based on case law and not on statutory legislation. A recent ruling by the federal labour court from 2017 endorsed that it only applies to workers covered by the Employment Protection Act.
Eurofound (2015), Germany: Reemployment obligation after restructuring, Restructuring legislation database, Dublin, https://apps.eurofound.europa.eu/legislationdb/reemployment-obligation-after-restructuring/germany
This Eurofound research paper explores key trends in restructuring in recent years, highlighting the companies that announced the largest job losses and job gains in the EU. It builds on an analysis of company announcements recorded in Eurofound’s European Restructuring Monitor (ERM), alongside a new classification of restructuring events involving changes in company location.
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Employers increasingly use tools such as email, SMS and messaging apps like WhatsApp or Signal to communicate with employees. While these technologies offer both efficiency and convenience, their use in communicating sensitive information, particularly for notifying employees of dismissal, raises legal concerns. This article explores the legal framework on dismissals across the EU, with a special focus on the use of digital means for communicating employment dismissals. Drawing on examples from various Member States, it examines the legal validity of digital dismissals.
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In 2023, thousands of workers in big tech lost their jobs. Meta, Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft and Salesforce had been considered to offer good and secure jobs up to this point. Giants of the information and communication technology (ICT) sector, these companies are among the highest paying, with Eurostat data from 2022 indicating that workers in ICT had the second-highest median gross hourly earnings (surpassed only by earnings in the financial sector).[1] These layoffs were a shock, especially as the biggest companies had hired extensively during the COVID-19 pandemic. What happened in the two years after this redundancy wave – was that the end of the cuts or did the companies start expanding again?
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In 2024, the automotive sector in the EU came to the fore in public and policy discussions. The focus was on the slowdown in electric vehicle (EV) sales, rising global competition, belated investments in new technologies, and the potential closure of production lines in Europe. A number of European car manufacturers and suppliers announced their intention to make large-scale redundancies and change long-standing collective agreements on job security and wages, while workers raised concerns amid demonstrations and industrial action.
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