Full-time employment often comes with benefits that are not typically offered to part-time, temporary, or flexible workers, such as annual leave, sick leave, and health insurance. Part-time jobs are mistakenly thought by some to not be careers. However, legislation exists to stop employers from discriminating against part-time workers so this should not be a factor when making decisions on career advancement.
They generally pay more than part-time jobs per hour, and this is similarly discriminatory if the pay decision is based on part-time status as a primary factor. The Fair Labor Standards Act does not define full-time employment or part-time employment. The definition by the employer can vary and is generally published in a company's Employee Handbook. Companies commonly require from 32 to 40 hours per week to be defined as full-time and therefore eligible for benefits. The Netherlands' average workweek for full-time employees is 37.3 hours, the second-lowest among the most affluent OECD countries.
With only 0.4% of employees working over 50 hours per week, the Dutch have some of the world's best work-life balance. Residents reported that they spend about 15.9 hours per day eating, sleeping, and leisure. Historically employers and employees often agreed on very long workweeks because the economy was not very productive (by today's standards) and people had to work long hours to earn enough money to feed, clothe and house their families. The long-term decline in the length of the workweek, in this view, has primarily been due to increased economic productivity, which has yielded higher wages for workers. Workers responded to this rise in potential income by "buying" more leisure time, as well as by buying more goods and services. In a recent survey, a sizeable majority of economic historians agreed with this view.
Over eighty percent accepted the proposition that "the reduction in the length of the workweek in American manufacturing before the Great Depression was primarily due to economic growth and the increased wages it brought" . For example, roughly two-thirds of economic historians surveyed rejected the proposition that the efforts of labor unions were the primary cause of the drop in work hours before the Great Depression. Eastern European immigrants worked significantly longer than others, as did people in industries whose output varied considerably from season to season. High unionization and strike levels reduced hours to a small degree.
The average female employee worked about six and a half fewer hours per week in 1919 than did the average male employee. In city-level comparisons, state maximum hours laws appear to have had little affect on average work hours, once the influences of other factors have been taken into account. One possibility is that these laws were passed only after economic forces lowered the length of the workweek. Overall, in cities where wages were one percent higher, hours were about -0.13 to -0.05 percent lower. Again, this suggests that during the era of declining hours, workers were willing to use higher wages to "buy" shorter hours. Labor markets became very tight during World War I as the demand for workers soared and the unemployment rate plunged.
These forces put workers in a strong bargaining position, which they used to obtain shorter work schedules. The move to shorter hours was also pushed by the federal government, which gave unprecedented support to unionization. The federal government began to intervene in labor disputes for the first time, and the National War Labor Board "almost invariably awarded the basic eight-hour day when the question of hours was at issue" in labor disputes . At the end of the war everyone wondered if organized labor would maintain its newfound power and the crucial test case was the steel industry.
These abnormally long hours were the subject of much denunciation and a major issue in a strike that began in September 1919. The strike failed (and organized labor's power receded during the 1920s), but four years later US Steel reduced its workday from twelve to eight hours. The move came after much arm-twisting by President Harding but its timing may be explained by immigration restrictions and the loss of immigrant workers who were willing to accept such long hours .
As the length of the workweek gradually declined, political agitation for shorter hours seems to have waned for the next two decades. However, immediately after the Civil War reductions in the length of the workweek reemerged as an important issue for organized labor. Roediger argues that many of the new ideas about shorter hours grew out of the abolitionists' critique of slavery — that long hours, like slavery, stunted aggregate demand in the economy. The hub of the newly launched movement was Boston and Grand Eight Hours Leagues sprang up around the country in 1865 and 1866. The leaders of the movement called the meeting of the first national organization to unite workers of different trades, the National Labor Union, which met in Baltimore in 1867. The passage of the state laws did foment action by workers — especially in Chicago where parades, a general strike, rioting and martial law ensued.
In only a few places did work hours fall after the passage of these laws. Many become disillusioned with the idea of using the government to promote shorter hours and by the late 1860s, efforts to push for a universal eight-hour day had been put on the back burner. Because of changing definitions and data sources there does not exist a consistent series of workweek estimates covering the entire twentieth century. Despite differences among the series, there is a fairly consistent pattern, with weekly hours falling considerably during the first third of the century and much more slowly thereafter.
In particular, hours fell strongly during the years surrounding World War I, so that by 1919 the eight-hour day had been won. Hours fell sharply at the beginning of the Great Depression, especially in manufacturing, then rebounded somewhat and peaked during World War II. After World War II, the length of the workweek stabilized around forty hours. Owen's nonstudent-male series shows little trend after World War II, but the other series show a slow, but steady, decline in the length of the average workweek. Greis's two series are based on the average length of the workyear and adjust for paid vacations, holidays and other time-off. The last column is based on information reported by individuals in the decennial censuses and in the Current Population Survey of 1988. It may be the most accurate and representative series, as it is based entirely on the responses of individuals rather than employers.
However in a recent study it was concluded that the acceptance of part-time work is widespread in the health sector. Employees wanting to work part time taken together with the hospital departments need for part time employees as a consequence of the shift work in the health sector, seemed to contribute to the organization of a 'part time culture'. Moreover, part time work was reported by many to contribute to greater flexibility, and less work-home conflicts.
Is 37 Hours A Week Full Time On the other hand, however, about 8% reported that they were not satisfied, because the average weekly working hours was lower than desired. According to the data from the EWCS 2005 the five days week is still the predominant norm in Norway, in all 63.8% report to be working 5 days a week of all employee's in Norway compared to an average of 64.5% across all EU countries. Compared to all other European Union countries Norway has a relatively high proportion of employees working less than five days a week. About 25% of all employees report to be working less than five days per week. This is the second highest proportion in Europe, with only the Netherlands reporting a higher proportion of people working less than five days a week. The relatively high proportion of employees working less than five days a week in Norway may be explained by the relatively high proportion of part time workers in Norway.
Overall, however, the data imply that the five days week is the predominant norm in Norway. Both full-time and part-time employees are protected by federal employment standards legislation concerning matters such as working hours, overtime pay and notice of termination . Provincial employment standards legislation gives most employees the basic minimum rights at work, and does not discriminate between full-time and part-time employees. All employees are entitled to wages, a regular pay period, vacation time and pay and all other statutory benefits.
The length of the workweek, like other labor market outcomes, is determined by the interaction of the supply and demand for labor. On the other hand, longer hours can bring reduced productivity due to worker fatigue and can bring worker demands for higher hourly wages to compensate for putting in long hours. If they set the workweek too high, workers may quit and few workers will be willing to work for them at a competitive wage rate. Thus, workers implicitly choose among a variety of jobs — some offering shorter hours and lower earnings, others offering longer hours and higher earnings. The movement for shorter hours as a depression-fighting work-sharing measure built such a seemingly irresistible momentum that by 1933 observers predicting that the "30-hour week was within a month of becoming federal law" . Labor leaders were persuaded by NIRA Section 7a's provisions — which guaranteed union organization and collective bargaining — to support the NIRA rather than the Black-Connery Thirty-Hour Bill.
Business, with the threat of thirty hours hanging over its head, fell raggedly into line. Despite a plan by NRA Administrator Hugh Johnson to make blanket provisions for a thirty-five hour workweek in all industry codes, by late August 1933, the momentum toward the thirty-hour week had dissipated. About half of employees covered by NRA codes had their hours set at forty per week and nearly 40 percent had workweeks longer than forty hours.
During the 1920s agitation for shorter workdays largely disappeared, now that the workweek had fallen to about 50 hours. However, pressure arose to grant half-holidays on Saturday or Saturday off — especially in industries whose workers were predominantly Jewish. By 1927 at least 262 large establishments had adopted the five-day week, while only 32 had it by 1920. The most notable action was Henry Ford's decision to adopt the five-day week in 1926. Ford employed more than half of the nation's approximately 400,000 workers with five-day weeks. However, Ford's motives were questioned by many employers who argued that productivity gains from reducing hours ceased beyond about forty-eight hours per week.
Even the reformist American Labor Legislation Review greeted the call for a five-day workweek with lukewarm interest. The banner years for maximum hours legislation were right around 1910. This may have been partly a reaction to the Supreme Court's ruling upholding female-hours legislation in the Muller vs. Oregon case . The Court's rulings were not always completely consistent during this period, however. In 1898 the Court upheld a maximum eight-hour day for workmen in the hazardous industries of mining and smelting in Utah in Holden vs. Hardy. In Lochner vs. New York , it rejected as unconstitutional New York's ten-hour day for bakers, which was also adopted out of concerns for safety.
The defendant showed that mortality rates in baking were only slightly above average, and lower than those for many unregulated occupations, arguing that this was special interest legislation, designed to favor unionized bakers. Several state courts, on the other hand, supported laws regulating the hours of men in only marginally hazardous work. By 1917, in Bunting vs. Oregon, the Supreme Court seemingly overturned the logic of the Lochner decision, supporting a state law that required overtime payment for all men working long hours. Men were allowed freedom of contract unless it could be proven that regulating their hours served a higher good for the population at large. Increasingly, the young turks are actually young Indians or young Chinese—or whatever smart and hardworking population offers a labor cost advantage. The threat of losing jobs to outsourcing arrangements is another driver in the rise of extreme work.
The days covering the period of leave are often referred to as lay days. Part-time employees are granted entitlements such as annual leave, sick leave and carers leave on a pro-rata basis according to their hours worked. Unlike casual employees, part-time workers are also guaranteed ongoing employment (or a fixed-term contract) and must give or receive notice to end their employment. The swift reduction of the workweek in the period around World War I has been extensively analyzed by Whaples . His findings support the consensus that economic growth was the key to reduced work hours. He finds that the rapid economic expansion of the World War I period, which pushed up real wages by more than 18 percent between 1914 and 1919, explains about half of the drop in the length of the workweek.
The reduction of immigration during the war was important, as it deprived employers of a group of workers who were willing to put in long hours, explaining about one-fifth of the hours decline. The rapid electrification of manufacturing seems also to have played an important role in reducing the workweek. Increased unionization explains about one-seventh of the reduction, and federal and state legislation and policies that mandated reduced workweeks also had a noticeable role.
The debate on work-life balance has also received some increased attentions during the last year, particularly in the media, frequently described as 'the time-squeeze' ('tidsklemma' is the Norwegian term). Data from Statistics Norway shows, however, that the cumulative time used on work, unpaid or paid, has in fact decreased for both genders during the last decades . Therefore, as a general phenomenon the so-called time-squeeze is not readily explained as a consequence time spent on paid or unpaid work. An alternative explanation has been that the work-family time-squeeze has less to do with the amount of work performed , and more to do with life-style and preferences.
The main argument is that people in general have higher expectations on behalf of oneself and the family, resulting in both more active family and personal lives. If one accepts this premise, the work-life balance challenge may be more accurately described as a priority matter, which has little to do with working hours per se. On the other hand, however, paid work may have a negative influence on work-family balance for some subgroups. Data from the latest survey of living showed that a higher proportion of men reported that their work interferes with their family life.
However, when adjusting for working time , the gender difference was no longer significant. Thus, the higher proportion of men reporting work-home interference was fully explained by the higher proportion of men working 45 hours or more per week. In all 28.1% of men and 8% of women report to work 45 hours or more per week. Among those with small children 31.2% of men and 7.8% of women reported to work 45 hours or more per week. There was, however, no gender difference in reported home-family interference among person working less than 45 hours per week (12.3% among men vs.11.8% among women reported to experience work family conflict rather often or often).
Mexico's average workweek for full-time employees is 48.5 hours. The average workweek in Iceland is 43.3 hours for full-time employees. The percentage of employees who work over 50 hours per week is very high, at 15.1%. In the United States, the average workweek for full-time employees is 41.5 hours. The U.S. has a high percentage of employees who work over 50 hours per week at 11.1%.
The average workweek for full-time employees in Poland is 40.9 hours. The average workweek for full-time employees in Portugal is 40.7 hours. The percentage of employees who worked over 50 hours per week is a little high at 8.3%. The average workweek for full-time employees in Switzerland is 40.5 hours. Tied with Norway, only 0.4% of employees work over 50 hours per week.
The average workweek for full-time employees in Slovakia is 40.3 hours. Belgium's average workweek for full-time employees is 38.8 hours. Employers decide how many hours per week is full-time and part-time, and what the differences will be. Part-time employees are usually offered limited benefits and health care.
For example, a part-time employee may not be eligible for paid time off, healthcare coverage, or paid sick leave. With the introduction of the Affordable Care Act , the definition of a full-time employee has been prescribed as a worker who spends an average of 30 or more hours per week on the job. Employers with 50 or more employees are required to offer health care to full-time employees under the ACA. A new cadre of social scientists began to offer evidence that long hours produced health-threatening, productivity-reducing fatigue.
This line of reasoning, advanced in the court brief of Louis Brandeis and Josephine Goldmark, was crucial in the Supreme Court's decision to support state regulation of women's hours in Muller vs. Oregon. In addition, data relating to hours and output among British and American war workers during World War I helped convince some that long hours could be counterproductive. Businessmen, however, frequently attacked the shorter hours movement as merely a ploy to raise wages, since workers were generally willing to work overtime at higher wage rates. When Samuel Slater built the first textile mills in the U.S., "workers labored from sun up to sun down in summer and during the darkness of both morning and evening in the winter.
Only attracted attention when they exceeded the common working day of twelve hours," according to Ware . This agitation was led by Sarah Bagley and the New England Female Labor Reform Association, which, beginning in 1845, petitioned the state legislature to intervene in the determination of hours. The petitions were followed by America's first-ever examination of labor conditions by a governmental investigating committee. The Massachusetts legislature proved to be very unsympathetic to the workers' demands, but similar complaints led to the passage of laws in New Hampshire and Pennsylvania , declaring ten hours to be the legal length of the working day. However, these laws also specified that a contract freely entered into by employee and employer could set any length for the workweek. Legislation passed by the federal government had a more direct, though limited effect.
On March 31, 1840, President Martin Van Buren issued an executive order mandating a ten-hour day for all federal employees engaged in manual work. Our most reliable estimates of the workweek come from manufacturing, since most employers required that manufacturing workers remain at work during precisely specified hours. The Census of Manufactures began to collect this information in 1880 but earlier estimates are available. Much of what is known about average work hours in the nineteenth century comes from two surveys of manufacturing hours taken by the federal government.
