The purpose of this handbook is to provide a ready reference tool for those interested in short-time compensation (STC) whereby work sharing is tied to pro-rata payment of regular weekly unemployment insurance (UI) benefits, as an alternative to layoffs. This handbook provides: a copy of the federal legislation enacted in 1982; a 1986 evaluation of the short-time compensation (STC) programs in the three states that pioneered in the development of STC programs; a comparative analysis of STC programs and the full text of STC legislation from the twelve States that have enacted such programs; STC reporting instructions and current statistics on State programs; and a list of key STC Regional and State contacts. The purpose of the study was to determine the effects of UI work search rules, the characteristics of claimants, and labor-market conditions on the work-search behavior of claimants (which is an intermediate outcome of interest) and on the length of UI claims spells, the job-finding success of claimants, and UI payment error rates (which are the ultimate outcomes of interest).