LINDA WERTHEIMER, host: Cuba's government announced, Monday, that it would lay off more than 500,000 workers - roughly 10 percent of the island's workforce. The layoffs will come over the next seven months. The communist government will try to ease the blow by allowing for more small-scale businesses, private farming, and the creation of new worker cooperatives.</s>LINDA WERTHEIMER, host: Nick Miroff reports from Havana.</s>NICK MIROFF: Raul Castro said in April that the state had more than a million excess workers on its payrolls. Now his government will begin eliminating them. The move reflects a major shift in the socialist model that has ruled here for five decades. In that state-dominated system, the government officially employs about 90 percent of Cuba's population. That has meant low wages, low productivity, and a feeble economy that cannot sustain the government's social goals, even with billions in subsidies from Venezuela's Hugo Chavez.</s>NICK MIROFF: As president, Raul Castro has been trying to reverse Cuba's long slide, making limited reforms that have yet to have much of an impact. But Monday's announcement suggests the pace of change here may quicken. Our state cannot and should not continue supporting businesses, production entities and services with inflated payrolls, it said.</s>NICK MIROFF: Details of the government's plans remain hazy, but one general trend seems to be that the Cuban state will increasingly act as a landlord, retaining ownership of commercial property while allowing small businesses and cooperatives to lease restaurants, repair shops, and other retail spaces.</s>NICK MIROFF: For NPR News, I'm Nick Miroff in Havana.
In an effort to pare state payrolls, Cuba has announced it will layoff 500,000 workers over the next year. Cuban leader Raul Castro last month warned layoffs would be coming and said Cuba would expand private enterprise.