FRANKFURT, Sept. 19 - A day after German voters split at the polls, tipping their country into political paralysis, Siemens, the industrial titan, announced Monday that it would cut 2,400 jobs in Germany.

It was the latest of several such housecleanings by German companies, underscoring the sharply divergent paths that German government and industry are taking as they confront difficult economic questions.

The election, which left no party with a mandate to form a government, is widely being interpreted as a rebuke to efforts to overhaul Germany's economy. Whichever party finally emerges with a workable coalition, experts say, it is likely to think twice about tackling the German welfare state.

Siemens, Germany's largest engineering company, said it had no choice but to make painful cuts. It is phasing out the jobs, in its computer-services unit, as part of a push to reduce costs by nearly $2 billion.

"Only successful companies create jobs and security," Klaus Kleinfeld, the chief executive of Siemens, said in a conference call with analysts and journalists.

With an economy that has stagnated for the past four years, Germany now has more than four million people out of work, close to a record in the postwar period. The chronic unemployment has sapped the confidence of consumers, depriving Germany of the recovery that even long-dormant Japan is now experiencing.

The steady loss of jobs was a central issue here this year, during which major employers like Volkswagen and Deutsche Bank announced deep employment cuts in their home market.

Some experts welcome the aggressiveness of those companies, saying it is a reason not to view the political deadlock in Berlin with too much alarm. While Germany's politicians may conclude there is no support for radical change, they say, business people are pressing ahead.

"German industry is restructuring quickly," said John C. Kornblum, a former American ambassador to Germany who now runs Lazard's office in Berlin. "The companies are taking care of a chunk of Germany's problems, without the government helping them."

As a result, he said, the German economy has become increasingly competitive in the past few years, enabling it to retain its status as the world's leading exporter. But the private sector cannot by itself fix Germany's unemployment crisis; its solution is mainly to cut jobs or move them out of the country, throwing more people out of work.

Economists and business people argue that the government needs to adopt policies that make it cheaper and more attractive to hire workers. It also needs to weaken the unions, they say, to make it easier to dismiss workers or renegotiate labor contracts.

Siemens and Volkswagen warn that if they cannot bring down labor costs in Germany, they will move operations to Eastern Europe or Asia. But they fear that the anti-reform sentiments expressed in the election could embolden the unions to resist making concessions in labor negotiations.

"You have a population hostile to reform, while at the same time the private sector cannot maintain the status quo," said Thomas Mayer, the chief European economist of Deutsche Bank. "The only way to reconcile this is to threaten to move abroad and put pressure on those left behind."

Mr. Kleinfeld of Siemens urged political leaders to plow ahead with an overhaul of the economy. Many chief executives expressed deep disappointment that Angela Merkel, the conservative opposition leader, could not put together a parliamentary majority with the pro-business Free Democratic Party.

"Business people like clarity," Richard Gaul, a senior executive at BMW, said as he sipped a glass of wine and watched the election results stream into the headquarters of the Social Democratic Party on Sunday. "This is going to be a mess, with the parties deciding whom they want to join up with."

Whatever coalition emerges, few here expect it to be more reform-minded than the current one, led by Chancellor Gerhard Schröder. He called the early election in May, after his attempts to shake up Germany's labor market cost him much of his support.

Mr. Schröder deprived Mrs. Merkel of a clear victory by painting her as a radical whose free-market policies would hurt ordinary people. Her much riticized economic adviser, Paul Kirchhof, who advocated a flat tax, said Monday that he would resign and return to teaching at the University of Heidelberg.

Even if Mrs. Merkel slipped into power - say, in a so-called grand coalition with Mr. Schröder's Social Democrats - she would probably have to water down her most significant proposals, among them a measure that would make it easier for smaller companies to hire and fire workers.

"What is the easiest way for the people to stop the reform process altogether?" Mr. Mayer of Deutsche Bank asked. "You immobilize the politicians who want to achieve the reforms."