Worklife

The Idea of a 4-Day Workweek Dates Back Decades. Are We Finally Making Progress?

The U.K. government’s plan to give workers the right to request a four-day work week could be a win for gender equality.

Josie Cox

Sep 3, 2024 — 7 min read

Illustration by Ruby Ash.

Almost three months after publishing a manifesto chock-full of shiny promises, and two months after assuming leadership of the U.K.’s embattled government, Britain’s Labour party may be starting to show signs of making good on one of its most avowed pledges: to be the party for working people.

Last week, news outlets in the U.K. reported on government plans to give workers the right to request “a four-day working week” without facing repercussions.

But those hoping the legislation might break new ground (it won’t) or be otherwise radical (it’s not) will be disappointed: For one thing, under the plan, employers would not in any way be required to grant such requests. For another, the rules are not designed to give people the opportunity to work fewer hours: Those who make a request would be asking to work the same number of hours, just compressed into fewer days.

Nevertheless, the move is noteworthy in as far as it mainstreams a necessary conversation about the ways in which the traditional parameters of the workday may no longer fit the reality of today—that is, an age in which a 9-to-5 job done only by dad, while mom stays home to raise the kids, is awkward, even impossible, for many.

It also might signal a subtle but profound shift in the dynamic between employer and employee: Where once an employer’s power over an employee’s day was largely unchallenged, now we have the worker calling at least some of the shots, provided the work gets done. And employers, eager to avoid anything resembling a great resignation, may be more willing to bend.

An Old Promise

As a concept, the four-day workweek (or indeed, a workweek that is different to the five-day-a-week-eight-hour-a-day norm that many are all-too familiar with) is not new. As far back as 1930, the economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that technological change and improvements in productivity would make a mere 15-hour workweek feasible within a few generations.

In 1956, Richard Nixon—at the time the vice president of the U.S.—promised Americans that they would only have to work four days "in the not too distant future." But here we are, 68 years later, and despite many trials and experiments staged around the world, the parameters of the workweek in many parts of many countries’ economies feel as cemented as ever.

Look no further than post-Covid return to work mandates that have forced employees back into physical offices five days a week. Much research shows that the flexibility employers were forced to offer their workers as a result of the pandemic had no discernible negative impact on productivity. In many cases, it actually had a positive impact. And yet, like a stubborn elastic band, workplace norms are snapping back into place.

So the news out of the U.K. (and by that we mean news in the loosest sense), though hardly grounds for celebration, provides a reason to be optimistic. Just as a fear of something unfamiliar can stymie opportunities for growth, a receptiveness to the prospect of change is so often the first step to progress. And if more employee flexibility works in the U.K., then who’s to say that a brave new world of (slightly more) flexible working can’t be replicated elsewhere?

A More Equal Economy?

For employers who could soon find themselves deciding whether to grant flexible working requests or not, it’s worth casting an eye over the already extensive body of research on the subject.

In Australia, for example, a recent study showed that shorter workweeks—or flexible hours—facilitate a better work-life balance for working parents.

That’s particularly true, the authors of the study noted, for the 72% of women in Australia who juggle the competing responsibilities of working and primary caregiving. And, of course, it’s also true for carers of older people and people with disabilities, of which many are women. Particularly encouraging: The academics found that Australian men who trialed a four-day workweek spent more time on childcare and housework, while women’s share of these responsibilities decreased.

“By reducing the traditional working week by one day without deducting pay, employees reported less burnout,” the authors wrote. “At the same time, businesses saw increased productivity, engagement and decreased absenteeism.”

Writing last year for People Management magazine, Sharon Peake, the CEO of a consultancy that specializes in enhancing gender equality in the workplace, notes that it’s well-known that “women’s opportunities and career progression are hindered by a nuanced interplay of societal, organizational and personal barriers.” She points out that, in the U.K., for every eight stay-at-home mothers there is one stay-at-home father.

Both mothers and fathers, Peake’s research has shown, are stigmatized for taking advantage of flexible working policies. Women—because of the disproportionate unpaid labor they tend to shoulder—are more likely to take advantage of them, but if a four-day workweek were widely adopted and accepted, then this cost of motherhood could be reduced too.

Peake writes that if mothers and fathers were both working four days a week, it would reduce the double burden that women face, but it might have other benefits too: Introducing a reduced work pattern for all genders, could, for example, “destigmatize part-time and flexible working for women,” she argues. “So, the negative consequences of being perceived to be less committed or able to take on managerial roles suddenly disappears as everyone has the same work pattern.”

No Panacea

But as ever, when it comes to women and work, things are not straightforward. And whatever a four-day workweek might achieve, it will certainly be no panacea for the inequality that’s ingrained in global labor markets.

I asked Heejung Chung, a professor of work at King’s Business School in London, and an expert on flexible working (she literally wrote the book), for her thoughts, and she raised several really important points.

Sure, a condensed workweek might serve many people well, but long hours introduce a serious risk of fatigue and burnout. (Some studies have shown that, for good health, the optimal number of working hours in the day is actually as low as five.)

Chung also picked up on Peake’s point about take-up: who’s likely to take advantage of these policies, and to what effect.

“If it's mostly women who end up working these condensed hours, then the policy's uptake might be stigmatized, which is what we've seen with remote working, and which could actually work against more gender equality in the workplace,” she told me. “But if both men and women take it up, including people in senior management, then it may well provide people with additional flexibility to adapt to their personal lives and crucially allow men to be more involved in the house and childcare on their extra day."

The details of Labour’s slated policy are, for now, uncertain. Perhaps in a perfect world, we’d be discussing how to incentivize everyone—regardless of gender—to take advantage of policies that allow for more flexible working. Maybe that would be the most efficient way of leveling the playing field. But the fact that a major government is showing signs of considering the real needs of real workers is, in itself, encouraging. In many countries, including the U.S., more women are working in the paid labor market than ever before. It’s high time the jobs they’re doing work for them. Failing women—failing mothers—means failing everyone.