The push for the four-day workweek
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 27 February 2023
⏱️ 27 minutes
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Summary
Today on Post Reports, we look at how the boundaries between work and life are potentially changing, from the feasibility of a four-day workweek to protections for workers when they're off the clock.
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The five-day workweek is the standard in the United States, and in many other countries across the world. But advocacy groups, and employees themselves, have been dreaming about the possibility of a four-day workweek. Recently, dozens of companies in the United Kingdom finished a four-day workweek pilot program; in the U.S., there is also state and federal legislation proposing employees work one day less for the same pay. Corporate culture reporter Taylor Telford explains how the pandemic has shifted our ideas about work, and how feasible a four-day workweek could really be.
Plus, we explore “the right to disconnect,” a movement that advocates for employees to be allowed to disengage from work after working hours. The Post’s Niha Masih explains how certain countries are protecting people from work encroaching on their personal time.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Taylor, how long have you been thinking about this idea of a four-day work week? |
| 0:08.1 | Oh, man. |
| 0:09.1 | I mean, I guess I've been just from a personal perspective, watching this unfold with great |
| 0:13.3 | enthusiasm from a distance throughout the pandemic like everybody. |
| 0:16.5 | I think it's a really interesting idea, but I'm definitely excited to have a chance to |
| 0:20.4 | look at it closer because it really seems like the tide is starting to turn. |
| 0:27.3 | This Taylor Telford, who covers corporate culture at the post, and I wanted to talk to Taylor |
| 0:32.0 | today because, well, it's Monday. |
| 0:35.4 | And like a lot of people, I really feel like I could have used another day this weekend |
| 0:40.7 | to do all the errands and cleaning and shopping that I needed to get done and also to just |
| 0:46.6 | have time to unplug and feel ready to work again. |
| 0:51.4 | Taylor says that the idea of a four-day work week used to be on the fringes. |
| 0:56.6 | Now it's becoming much more commonplace. |
| 0:59.6 | I would say broadly, just the pandemic has disrupted so many long-held beliefs about the way |
| 1:05.5 | that work has to be done. |
| 1:07.9 | And the idea of a four-day work week is so tied into a lot of the debates that are raging |
| 1:12.1 | right now about work life balance and productivity and bringing your whole self to work. |
| 1:17.4 | It really seems to be, for a lot of people, a really exciting alternative to the kind of |
| 1:23.5 | 9-5, which is widely accepted to be pretty dead at least in the way that it's existed |
| 1:29.2 | for like decades and decades leading up to this. |
| 1:34.1 | From the Newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. |
| 1:37.3 | I'm Ella Haye-Zadi. |
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