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32 hour work week
'Not a Radical Idea': Bernie Sanders Unveils 32-Hour Workweek Bill
"It is time to reduce the stress level in our country and allow Americans to enjoy a better quality of life," said Sen. Bernie Sanders. "It is time for a 32-hour workweek with no loss in pay."
Mar 13, 2024
Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday introduced legislation that would establish a 32-hour workweek in the U.S. with no loss of pay, a change the Vermont senator said is necessary to ensure the working class benefits from massive productivity gains and technological advances.
A 32-hour workweek "is not a radical idea," Sanders, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, said in a statement, noting that productivity gains have far outpaced wage growth in recent decades.
"Today, American workers are over 400% more productive than they were in the 1940s. And yet, millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages than they were decades ago. That has got to change," said Sanders. "The financial gains from the major advancements in artificial intelligence, automation, and new technology must benefit the working class, not just corporate CEOs and wealthy stockholders on Wall Street."
"It is time to reduce the stress level in our country and allow Americans to enjoy a better quality of life," Sanders added. "It is time for a 32-hour workweek with no loss in pay."
Sanders introduced the Senate bill alongside Sen. Laphonza Butler (D-Calif.). Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), who has led 32-hour workweek bills in previous sessions, unveiled companion legislation in the House.
"As the lead sponsor of the Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act in the House of Representatives and a senior member of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, I am thrilled Senator Sanders is leading the Senate companion to this transformative legislation that will be a win for both workers and workplaces," Takano said Wednesday.
"Increasing evidence firmly supports that reducing working hours yields beneficial outcomes for businesses, individuals, and the broader community."
The legislation was introduced shortly after Sanders announced that the Senate HELP Committee—which he chairs—will hold a hearing Thursday on the idea of a 32-hour workweek, which has gained traction among labor leaders and lawmakers amid promising experimental results.
Thursday's hearing will feature testimony from United Auto Workers (UAW) president Shawn Fain—whose initial contract demands to the Big Three automakers included a 32-hour workweek—and Juliet Schor, a sociology professor at Boston College who has led a team researching four-day workweek trials across the globe.
"Our research suggests that the four-day, 32-hour week is not only feasible; it's better for workers and employers," Shor wrote in a recent op-ed with fellow Boston College professor Wen Fan. "Of more than 100 companies with thousands of workers around the world, nearly 70% experienced reduced rates of burnout. Stress fell. Reported physical and mental health improved. People felt less anxious and fatigued, exercised more, and slept better. Their life satisfaction rose, and conflicts among work, family, and life plummeted."
According to a summary released by Sanders' office, the new legislation would:
- Reduce the standard workweek from 40 to 32 hours over four years by lowering the maximum hours threshold for overtime compensation for non-exempt employees.
- Require overtime pay at time and a half for workdays longer than eight hours, and overtime pay at double a worker's regular pay for workdays longer than 12 hours; and
- Protect workers' pay and benefits to ensure that a reduction in the workweek does not cause a loss in pay.
Major labor unions, including the UAW and the AFL-CIO, have endorsed the new legislation, as has 4 Day Week Global, a group that has organized four-day workweek pilot programs in the U.S., United Kingdom, Australia, and other countries.
"This bill underscores the escalating trend towards diminishing work hours," said Dr. Dale Whelehan, CEO of 4 Day Week Global. "Increasing evidence firmly supports that reducing working hours yields beneficial outcomes for businesses, individuals, and the broader community. At 4 Day Week Global, we are thrilled to support this endeavor spearheaded by Senator Bernie Sanders, marking further progress towards a future of work that prioritizes sustainable human performance and well-being."
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'Not a Radical Idea': Sanders Calls for 32-Hour Workweek With No Pay Cuts
"It's time to make sure that working people benefit from rapidly increasing technology, not just large corporations that are already doing phenomenally well."
May 04, 2023
Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday called for a 32-hour workweek with no pay cuts for U.S. employees, pointing to the overwhelmingly positive results in nations that have recently experimented with or enacted shorter workweeks.
"Moving to a 32-hour workweek with no loss of pay is not a radical idea," Sanders (I-Vt.), the chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, wrote in an op-ed in The Guardian. "In fact, movement in that direction is already taking place in other developed countries. France, the seventh-largest economy in the world, has a 35-hour workweek and is considering reducing it to 32. The workweek in Norway and Denmark is about 37 hours."
The senator also pointed to a recent four-day workweek pilot program in the United Kingdom, where more than 90% of participating companies said the trial was so successful that they have no plans to return to a five-day workweek.
"Not surprisingly, it showed that happy workers were more productive," Sanders wrote. "Another pilot of nearly 1,000 workers at 33 companies in seven countries found that revenue increased by more than 37% in the companies that participated and 97% of workers were happy with the four-day workweek."
Sanders also noted that "an explosion in technology" in recent decades, and associated increases in worker productivity, have not prompted any changes to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the 1938 law that established the 40-hour workweek.
Between 1979 and 2021, according to the Economic Policy Institute, worker productivity rose by nearly 65% while hourly pay rose just 17.3%.
"The result: millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages, with the average worker making nearly $50 a week less than he or she did 50 years ago, after adjusting for inflation," wrote Sanders, who has said he will introduce legislation Thursday that would raise the federal minimum wage to $17 an hour.
"It's time to reduce the workweek to 32 hours with no loss in pay," the senator continued. "It's time to reduce the stress level in our country and allow Americans to enjoy a better quality of life. It's time to make sure that working people benefit from rapidly increasing technology, not just large corporations that are already doing phenomenally well."
"It's time to reduce the stress level in our country and allow Americans to enjoy a better quality of life."
Sanders is one of just a handful of U.S. lawmakers to endorse a 32-hour workweek. Earlier this year, Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) reintroduced his Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act, legislation that would cut the standard U.S. workweek by amending the FLSA.
The bill currently has just two co-sponsors: Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.). The measure has also been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, the Service Employees International Union, the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, and other organizations.
"Workers across the nation are collectively reimagining their relationship to labor—and our laws need to follow suit," Takano said in March. "We have before us the opportunity to make common sense changes to work standards passed down from a different era. The Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act would improve the quality of life of workers, meeting the demand for a more truncated workweek that allows room to live, play, and enjoy life more fully outside of work."
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