Sixty-five years ago this month, President Richard Nixon made front-page news predicting that America was moving toward a four-day workweek. We’re nowhere near Nixon’s goal — and even further from John Maynard Keynes’s 1928 prediction that we’d all be working 15-hour weeks by 2028. But with record numbers of people quitting their jobs during the pandemic in what’s being called the Great Resignation, it’s time for more employers to consider offering their workers a four-day workweek.
Millions of people accustomed to working five days a week in an office got a taste of work-from-home freedom during the pandemic and don’t want to go back to the rat race routine. Forty-one percent of U.S. workers are considering leaving their jobs within the next six months, according to a recent survey from Credit Karma, and a record 10.1 million jobs remain unfilled.
Even before the pandemic, every available happiness metric revealed worrying trends about American life, including increased mental illnesses, declining civic and social engagement with friends and family, work burnout, drug overdoses, and suicide rates. We can’t blame all of our problems on being overworked, but it’s a good place to start. This Labor Day weekend, remember how you feel on Sunday night knowing you have another day off to look forward to, and imagine how your life would change if you had that same feeling every week.
A number of employers, including Kickstarter, Shake Shack, Basecamp, Microsoft, Uniqlo, Wildbit, and Buffer, have adopted or experimented with four-day workweeks. Fifteen percent of the 60,000 U.S. companies that participated in a 2019 Society For Human Resources Management survey said they offer a four-day workweek of 32 hours or fewer. The survey indicated that employers with four-day workweeks reported no decline in productivity or revenue.
Another study, this one conducted by a U.K. think tank called Autonomy, showed improvements in well-being and productivity for 2,500 workers in Iceland who logged fewer hours with no pay cut. And almost two-thirds of businesses with a four-day week reported improved productivity, according to a study from the University of Reading.
In March, Spain’s government said it would pay companies to test out a four-day week. Politicians often promise “free” stuff to voters, but few focus on life’s most valuable commodity: time. There have been few serious legislative efforts to reduce working hours since 1933, when the Senate passed a 30-hour workweek bill that ultimately died in the House. In any case, I prefer a free market approach where the shift to a four-day week occurs organically as a result of employers wanting to attract and retain talent.
Until the 20th century, a six-day workweek was standard in most countries. In 1908, a New England mill became the first U.S. factory to institute the five-day week in order to accommodate Jewish workers who wished to observe the Sabbath.
In 1926, Henry Ford started to give his employees two days off because he thought they’d buy more cars if they had more leisure time.
Ford was correct. Think about how and when you spend your money. Four-day workweeks would be a bonanza for the travel industry, which employs roughly 1 in 10 worldwide. Retailers, restaurants, and other leisure-oriented businesses would thrive. The origins of the six- and five-day workweeks date to a time when most women were at home. With far more women now in the workforce, real leisure time is more elusive as men and women use their nights and weekends on childcare, chores, cooking, shopping, paying bills, and managing the household.
Many employers overestimate how much time is needed to perform jobs without realizing how much time their charges waste surfing the internet, using social media, trading stocks, conducting personal business, and socializing. Some employees have so much free time, as this recent profile in the Wall Street Journal chronicled, that they secretly have second jobs or businesses they run on the side.
With only four days a week to get their work done, employees will be motivated to use their time wisely for fear of having to go back to five-day workweeks or losing their jobs. Giving every employee Friday or Monday off won’t work for some businesses, but some companies who have four-day workweeks juggle schedules so half their employees get one day off, half the other.
I’ve worked at home for 12 years, and I love it. As a freelance writer, if I work fewer hours, I make less money. But if four-day workweeks become the norm, many people like me will be tempted to seek traditional employment rather than gig work, which is appealing because it leaves us time for other pursuits and responsibilities. The labor force participation rate is just 61.7%, down from 63.3% before the pandemic. Many workers, particularly parents juggling childcare responsibilities, will also be tempted to enter or reenter the labor force if they can be paid for full-time work and enjoy three days off per week.
Americans are renowned for their ingenuity. But we’ve never been a world leader or anything close to it when it comes to taking time off. Perhaps this is because many of us still subscribe to outdated notions about “putting in the hours” instead of focusing on maximizing efficiency.
The person who puts in 60 hours a week at the office appears to be more devoted, even if they squander half that time looking at Facebook, playing fantasy football, and wasting everyone’s time at meetings with needless grandstanding. We should all remember that no one ever says on their deathbed that they wish they’d put in more hours at the office. Every employer wants people who value their jobs and would hate to lose them. Companies can transform how their staff members perceive their jobs with three magic words that will end their recruiting struggles overnight: three-day weekend.
Dave Seminara is a writer and former diplomat. He is the author of Mad Travelers: A Tale of Wanderlust, Greed & the Quest to Reach the Ends of the Earth.
