Some States Consider Legislation Making 4-Day Workweeks More Common - Slashdot

• Re:

  "Are the states making the payroll or just advocating for this change based on politics? Answer is obvious to me but, hey, I'm listening as a business owner."

  You have to hire 20% more people to get the same REAL work done, unless it's some service industry where they'd just bill the client the same amount but stay home on Fridays.

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  • You have to hire 20% more people to get the same REAL work done,

    Depends on how you define "real work".

    Unless it's some service industry where they'd just bill the client the same amount but stay home on Fridays.

    Exactly the opposite. In a service industry, hours spent behind the cash register is real work. If they're behind the cash register 8 hours more, that's 8 hours more real work. In work requiring brainpower, however, people burn out after some number of hours. You can keep them in the office longer, but their productivity gets progressively less, and you only get so much real work done.

• Re:

  These are pilot programs only, they're not mandating this.

  If it were mandated, then I'd have to work 4 days instead of my normal 3...

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• also need to add an X2 OT level at say 60-70+

  Most states already have that.

  In some states, OT is based on daily rather than weekly hours. In California, employees get x1.5 after 8 hours in a day and x2 for over 12 hours.

  The best way to abuse employees is to move them to salaries and/or give them a job title that includes "manager" so they are exempt from overtime rules.

  • Re:

    A title doesn't change anything in California. We had a person covered by the professional exemption that the labor board still said we owed overtime to since we worked a 4/9/4 schedule. Complete BS. (Engineering grads without an EIT were considered non-exempt, with EIT were exempt and eligible for straight-time OT, and PEs were considered exempt and above a certain salary threshold (around $90k) no longer eligible for straight-time OT.)

  • Re:

    Which could be easily fixed by requiring a minimum salary to qualify for overtime rules due to executive duties.

    Where I work you need to have at least a salary of about 350k per year to be exempt for that reason.

• Re:

  Presumably they have done the math and figured out that some businesses they want to affect would benefit sufficiently from the tax credit that they might give it a go. Or it might be targeted at one particular industry, or even a specific business.

  • Presumably they have done the math and figured out that some businesses they want to affect would benefit sufficiently from the tax credit that they might give it a go. Or it might be targeted at one particular industry, or even a specific business.

    The real problem in my mind is that if you have to pay overtime above 32 hours, and have to pay health insurance for workers who work more than 30 hours, there's a strong perverse incentive to employ workers for two fewer hours per week and stop paying for their health insurance.

    We need to start with laws that guarantee part-time workers proportional benefits across the board, whether those workers are hourly or salaried. Otherwise, laws like this are probably just going to expand the wage slave class without actually benefitting anyone.

    And once you have those sorts of laws in place, there's no longer any meaningful advantage to requiring workers to work 40 hours per week other than management overhead, so the companies will no longer need large tax breaks to incentivize them to let employees work fewer hours if they choose.

    • Re:

      Ah, you mean like most other developed countries? Oh, & universal healthcare?

    • If you want a cheaper system which also provides better healthcare to everyone then have a look at what everyone else in the world does and pick the bits that you think will work best for America.
      The system you're currently lumbered with is the worse possible one.

    • Re:

      Any company doing that would see current employees walking out the door and be unable to attract new workers.

      Labor is a market, and markets don't work by one side dictating terms and the other side passively accepting them.

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  Its counter intuitive but theres a growing pile of research finding that reducing hours increases productivity and that 4 days seems to be the optimal solution for "how much effective work can you get out of one person in a week".

  Some companies do this already and have had a lot of success with it.

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    Not when you're working an hourly job where the equipment will produce x widgets in an hour of work. No research in the world will run that factory an extra 20% per week for free.

    • Re:

      When they were first talking about a 4 day work week, I assumed they were talking about 4X10. A 4X8 work week isn't likely to catch on with employers, at least in the real world.

    • Re:

      If you're purely a button pusher, you can be replaced by a MUCH more effective button pusher.

      If you're actually working, then yes, it's been shown that decreasing hours can make you more productive. Fewer mistakes, less goofing off.

      Eight hour shifts do have the advantage of dividing the day into three, but shorter shifts with maintenance time or eight hour days with four day weeks work just as well as eight hour days with five day weeks.

  • Increases productivity where the nature of the job allows for it.

    Dropping a software developer, where the productivity is often based on the individuals ability over the working week, down to 4 days might indeed have that outcome.

    Dropping a fast food worker, where the productivity is often based on external things like rush hour, grill capacity etc, down to 4 days probably wont have the same effect.

    What this will do for minimum wage low skilled jobs is free the worker up to get more hours at a second job - no, I am not saying that that is a good thing that should be encouraged (although it means more income for the worker overall, it also means the point of the hours reduction is missed entirely), Im saying that that is going to be the outcome should this be applied across the board. And if its not applied across the board, then we run into class issues.

    Im sure this has positive outcomes in high wage jobs, where the fifth day is now probably a day of leisure, but not so much for lower paid workers IMHO.

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      Thought - is this all that different to now where you have lower paid jobs which include evening and weekend work, vs jobs which are 9-5?

      • Re:

        Definitely food for thought.

        Yes it is different because right now the scope of those jobs is dictated by the relationship between the employer and employee - its not mandated by the government. Which this would be.

        Imagine if there was a different minimum wage for people in 9-5 jobs (and here I assume you mean salaried) and people in hourly jobs - because thats effectively what would be happening if this wasnt applied across the board.

        BTW Im not an American, and since I left retail (ooooh, 25 years ago now

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    • Re:

      That's the whole reason why such thing is considered for California and not, say, Bangladesh (economy based on x widgets per hour). The wealth of California as compared to "competing" economies (other US states and foreign countries), comes form the high-wages workers it manages to attract and keep. These workers might feel more attracted if the work week is publicized as shorter than elsewhere. I mean, I live and work in Europe, a major deterrent for people here when considering moving to US is the reputat

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      • Re:

        I hear what you are saying, but at the same time California has a massive service-based economy as well - and those are the lower paid workers who simply wont get the same benefit from this, because their "extra day off" will just become overtime or more hours at a second job.

        Once again its the inequality in the job market which causes this - and I agree with you that California and other states are doing this to make their higher income jobs look more appealing, but at the same time its going to cause diss

        • Re:

          From what I understand, this results in a net increase of salary of low paid workers, for same hours worked. The advantage for high pay people is more leisure time, the advantage for low pay people is more money. I see it as reducing the economical inequality.

          You could argue it would increases happiness inequality (beyond money), but data shows https://ourworldindata.org/hap... [ourworldindata.org] that happiness inequality reduces when salaries increase, even when economical inequality increases.

          • Re:

            As I said in my post, its going to net like an extra $100 a week for a low paid worker.

            That might round some corners for someone, but its not life changing by any means.

            The inequality in the benefit here is what Im raising as an issue - for some, it means they get to pay an extra bill that week, for others it means an entire day off to do what they want. Theres no reduction in economical inequality here, I see it as increasing it.

            Thats what we need to fix in our society.

  • Re:

    "Its counter intuitive but theres a growing pile of research finding that reducing hours increases productivity and that 4 days seems to be the optimal solution for "how much effective work can you get out of one person in a week"."

    Hiring 5 people to work one day per week would be top for the employer, you can act out Glengarry Glen Ross and fire the worst performer every week/month.
    The terror rule would be absolute.

• Re:

  The summary also includes business process improvement which will allow the employees to be more efficient.
  There are plenty of Fridays where we just see the office just shutdown mentally. There is more chatter, longer lunches, projects that may take a hour to do are put on hold for Monday. In many cases having an extra off, expecting to do the same amount of work for the same pay would be a bad deal, unless it is accompanied by fixing process.

  • Re:

    You're talking about software / office jobs, which are mostly salaried, and yeah, there's some waste there (we typically assume 6.5 hours of productivity / day for a 40 hour week, though i doubt you'll get anywhere near 32 hours of productivity from a four day week -- probably still around 6.5 hours / day). As I stated, I'm talking about hourly workers. Even for someone like a janitor this means 20% less stuff per week that got cleaned. It's in the manufacturing sector though that this really becomes unw

• Re:

  Sure you can. There's a big difference between "Keep your chair from flying up and hitting the ceiling" and "you can go home when this task is done."

• Re:

  Federal law says that you have to pay $290 for a full time week. In many states you have to pay $300 to $600 or more for a full time week. These high wage states still compete. My argument has been that we need a 30 hour work week and a $15 minimum wage to maximize employment and workers who get full benefits.

  I also think it wil promote automation, which has been typically good for the economy, though bad for workers who refused to become skilled.

• Re:

  Apparently, the evidence is that it is competitive with companies that make their employees work a 40 hour week. Reduction in hours doesn't mean a reduction in productivity & in some cases an increase. For those who treat work like a religion, this will be a difficult adjustment to make.

• Re:

  This is such a weird attitude. As if the units you're paid in matter.

  The (US) template for reducing working hours is Henry Ford. Those were hourly, blue collar, etc. and blah blah, employees.

  The point is that not only can you compete by reducing working hours, you increase overall productivity.

• Re:

  The old chemical plant would need five shifts instead of four. That would apply to all the 24 hour operations. Averaged out over 4 shifts that is 2 hours of over time a week. If 32 hours is now full time you have 10 hours of overtime,

  So what would a five shift rotation look like? Would you just add a day between shift changes?

  Management will probably want to cut the straight time rate enough to make the weekly check the same regardless of the extra overtime. That is not likely to over well.

  Still it is an i

• Re:

  With regards to companies and taxes: what country do you live in? It certainly isn’t the USA. Companies here absolutely hate paying taxes with the white hot passion of a thousand flaming supernovas. They will tolerate literally ANYTHING in order to reduce taxes. Forget about the massive internet companies - most employers in the US are small and medium sized companies, and they are staunch republicans. Why? Because the republicans cut taxes EVERY time they get the White House. It’s like clockwor

• Re:

  Yep. I'd add... If we could measure actual productivity effects we might be able to provide incentives. I'd rather focus on that, then make all money "extra".

  Meaning make it possible to live without working, but allow people to work for more income to allow premium purchases.

  Today the incentive is to cheat everyone else. Zero sum games always are. Prisoner's dilemma taught us that it's best to cheat your friend because they likely will too. Change the incentives.

  The FACT that multiple people have "inv

• Re:

  They're not working kids in coal mines.

  They're working them in auto plants, meat packing facilities, construction sites, and agriculture.

  https://www.axios.com/2023/02/... [axios.com]

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