Work, 4 days a week is a success. It can also land in Italy

Work, in Iceland the short working day is a “smashing success”. Equal amount of employees: the result is less pressure and increased production. Experiment conducted by City Council Reykjavik And by the national government, it was established from 2015 to 2019

Engaging 2,500 employees (equivalent to 1% of the Icelandic working population) from various sectors, from nurseries, to office workers, to social service providers and hospitals. For the 4-day workweek, pay remained unchanged. Test results showed productivity remained the same or even increased in most workplaces, Ansa reports. Specifically, we moved from the usual work week, from 40 hours, to 35 or 36 hours, in reference to which workers interviewed reported feeling “less stress and at risk of burnout” and also confirmed an improvement in work balance. Private life.

After the auditions, unions pushed for renegotiation of business models. Researchers from Britain’s Autonomy Research Center and the Association for Sustainable Democracy (Alda) in Iceland said that 86% of Iceland’s workforce switched to shorter working hours for the same pay, or would have qualified. Moreover, other countries have followed the Icelandic example that are now trying to test their hands, including Spain, New Zealand, and Unilever.

“This study shows that the world’s largest trial of a shorter work week in the public sector has been an all-round crushing success,” said Will Strong, Autonomy’s Director of Research. “It shows that the public sector has matured to be a leader in shorter working weeks – and other governments can draw lessons from it.”

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