Arguments for a four-day work week

“We should work to live, not live to work”, declared John McDonnell in his speech to the Labour Party Conference. He followed this up with a commitment to the goal of a 32-hour, four-day work week. The goal, McDonnell stated, was to be achieved within ten years, and importantly, was to be realised with no loss of pay.

 

The reduction of the working week to four-days would be truly transformative. Indeed, it would represent a radical break with the dominant work culture that exists in our contemporary capitalist society.

 

Yet, its radicalism also presents challenges. Will business accept a cut in the working week? What kind of legislation will be required to achieve the cut? Ultimately, can capitalism be adapted to accommodate a four-day week or will it require us to imagine – and create – a future beyond capitalism?

 

The case for working less

 

The arguments for working less are compelling. Shorter work hours would free up time for us do and be things outside of work. It would enable to live better lives.

 

Evidence shows how longer work hours are associated with various forms of sickness – both physical and mental. The reduction of work hours, in this case, could help to raise the health and well-being of workers.

 

Beyond personal benefits, we could mitigate the effects of climate change by working less. The work-spend treadmill has an environmental cost that we could resolve by curbing the time we devote to work.

 

Less work could also pay for itself by giving rise to higher productivity. Rested bodies and minds make for more productive hours and offer the opportunity to produce what we need with more free time.

 

Finally, we might also work better. If we eliminate hours of drudgery, we could leave more time for us to enjoy more rewarding work. Reducing working hours is as much about enhancing the quality of work as about reducing its burden.

 

Work’s persistence

 

But the system in which we live keeps on pressing us to work more. It was once assumed that capitalism would develop in ways that would deliver shorter work hours. Back in 1930, the economist John Maynard Keynes famously dreamed of a 15 hour work week by 2030. He thought that this outcome would be achieved through c no fundamental reform of capitalism.

 

In reality, however, hours of work in capitalist economies have remained stubbornly high and have even shown signs of increase (especially since the global financial crisis). Large differences in work hours exist between countries, to be sure. German workers enjoy shorter work hours than their US counterparts, for example.

 

But no country stands anywhere close to achieving a 15- or even 30-hour work week in the next ten years. Indeed, on current trends, most capitalist economies look set to have average working weeks more than double Keynes’s prediction.

 

The reasons for this stagnation in work hours are varied. On the one hand, there is the issue of power. Workers cannot hope to secure shorter hours if they lack the bargaining power to realise them. The decline of unions and shift towards the ‘shareholder value model’ of management has resulted in  many people working longer, or the same hours, for lower pay.

 

On the other hand, the continued force of consumerism has acted as a prop to the work ethic. Advertising and product innovation have created a culture where longer hours have been accepted as normal, even while they have inhibited the freedom of workers to live well.

 

Making it happen

 

The challenge for any political party that is committed to the goal of working less is to overcome the above obstacles. Notably, the Labour Party has rejected an economy-wide curb on work time. Instead, it favours a sectoral approach, via a renewed system of collective bargaining.

 

McDonnell has suggested that working hours (along with wage rates and conditions) could be agreed at a sector level through negotiation between employers and trade unions. Any agreements brokered on reduced working hours could then become legally binding. This approach, in some ways, follows the lead of collective bargaining arrangements in Germany, where employers and trade unions have agreed on shorter working weeks.

 

The problem here will be reviving collective bargaining in the context of low union membership. Some sectors in services (such as the retail and care sectors), for example, have a very limited union presence and curbing work hours may be difficult to achieve under this policy.

 

McDonnell has also proposed the creation of a ‘Working Time Commission’ with the power to recommend the government increases statutory leave entitlements as quickly as possible without increasing unemployment’. This is more promising in that it aims to create a new debate – and ideally a new consensus – around the case for shortening work time across the economy as a whole. One effect of this Commission might be the recommendation and implementation of a four-day work week in all sectors.

 

A wider policy agenda for shorter work hours is set forth in a new report written by Lord Skidelsky, which was commissioned by McDonnell. While there are areas to disagree on, the report itself – and the policy commitment of the Labour Party – mark a significant step forward in the discussion of reducing work time. Generally, there now seems greater pressure to secure a four-day or even three-day work week.

 

Still the barriers to change remain formidable. As seen in the reception by industry groups to Labour’s policy announcement, business will take some convincing about the merits of a shorter working week.

 

But the scepticism of business only shows how far we need to rethink the economy and life more generally. If we continue to work as long as we do, we will not just keep on damaging ourselves, but also our planet. Working less, in short, is not some luxury, but a necessary part of our progress as human beings.

** This article first appeared at the Conversation

Davos: why measures of economic progress must consider the quality of work on offer

Davos offers a place for the rich and not-so-famous to meet and exchange views on the present and future of capitalism. As in previous years, the theme of automation and the “fourth industrial revolution” has been a core of the 2019 meeting. The concern is over how technology might help to raise economic growth and add to prosperity.

Lip service, of course, is paid to wider social and ethical goals, but in truth the central concern is with the needs of the global economy. The worship of growth (measured by GDP) dominates proceedings.

But this focus diverts attention from what are pressing problems in society. In particular, it misses the costs of work. Far from the ski slopes of Davos are real people struggling in dull jobs and on stagnant incomes. Any consideration of how technology will destroy or create jobs needs to recognise that the quality of the work we do is also important.

The fourth industrial revolution includes the rise of artificial intelligence, 3D printers and driverless cars. While many fear the disappearance of jobs due to digital automation, debate at Davos recognises the capacity for technology to create new jobs. It will present new sources of demand and new work opportunities such as engineers to design and service the new digital architecture.

Yet, the prospect of jobs growth is itself a problem if it means workers working in more low quality jobs. If technology erodes the skill content of work, drives down wages, and raises the duration and intensity of work, then workers may face the prospect of having to undertake work that is much worse than now.

Work realities

The rise of the so-called “gig economy” shows the darker side of technological innovation. Advanced economies have seen a steady decline in skilled manufacturing jobs and the growth of low-skilled zero-hours contracts jobs in their place. Meanwhile, the output of large corporations continues to grow, showing how technology can be harnessed for profit-making, at the expense of the welfare of workers.

The hard realities of work in modern society speak to the limits of visions of progressive change via automation. They highlight, in particular, how technology may add to the problems of work, while sustaining people in work.

The focus on economic growth, as measured by GDP, does not help here. Consider an economy where GDP is rising. Growth may be fuelled by rising employment, higher work force participation, and/or longer work hours. But this fails to consider the costs of the work involved. The fact that GDP may depend on a substantial number of workers being exposed to toxic conditions at work is obscured. And the process of generating GDP growth often has an environmental impact, including more pollution and waste.

Automation as distraction

At Davos and other forums, it is convenient for big business to focus on the topic of automation. It creates, on the one hand, a sense of fear about the future of work. This fear is useful for capital owners because it helps to suppress wages and reduce demands for better work, as people become just so grateful to have a job at all.

The focus on automation, on the other hand, helps to win support for the status quo. Capitalism, so the story goes, is not to blame for the ills of work, but rather these ills stem from the seemingly natural processes of technological change. Technology, in this way, becomes a useful mechanism to hide the specific injustices of work linked to existing corporate structures and practices.

Davos promotes the fourth industrial revolution slogan, in part because it reflects the interests of the class that it represents.

In our society, technology does not guarantee – as it should – more leisure time and more meaningful work; rather it offers more work and, for many, greater drudgery. Paradoxically, the prospect is of work continuing, while technology advances.

The reason for this paradox relates at an essential level to unequal power. It reflects who owns and controls technology – how powerful capital owners can use it in the service of profit generation. The discussion at Davos about technological change remains closed to voices demanding real change. Yet it is only by reimagining technology – its ownership and control – that we can create a better automated future.

Meanwhile, concerns about sustaining economic prosperity must incorporate measures of the quality of work available to people. Beyond growth, we need to embrace measures of progress that capture how well work fits us as human beings. Some useful attempts to define the quality of work exist. The challenge is to use these in conjunction with other measures such as GDP to come up with broader indicators of economic and social progress. That way, we might realise ways of working and living that are to the benefit of all.


*** This blog was originally post at the Conversation