Shortened work week – good or bad for the economy?

The idea of ​​shortening the working week in Russia does not cease to hover in the Duma corridors. Recently, a State Duma deputy, a member of the Committee on Labor, Social Policy and Veterans Affairs, Svetlana Bessarab, decided to raise this topic again. The Federation of Independent Trade Unions of the Russian Federation also came out in support of the idea to reduce the working week to 36 hours. Although, according to the head of the Federation, Mikhail Shmakov, against the backdrop of a shortage of workers, the introduction of this proposal is premature. Stanislav Bovt, financial analyst of the CMS group of companies, expressed his point of view on this issue to Moskovskaya Pravda.

A four-day work week is the dream of many. And some countries apply this model quite successfully. Moreover, in Norway, Denmark, Holland, the United Arab Emirates and Australia, where the working week is the shortest, the standard of living is quite high. According to the expert, this suggests that it is important not how many people work, but how efficiently they allocate their working time.

– It seems to me that the very idea of ​​reducing the working week to 36 hours is quite realistic, – says Stanislav Bovt. I will give an example from my own experience. The management of a large financial holding, where I worked as a teacher, relied on the main indicator – the effectiveness of the implementation of tasks, without focusing on how much time it took the employee. For 10 years, the holding has become a leader in its industry. Another example: an acquaintance of mine, a highly qualified specialist in the field of polymers, worked in a small production facility, whose management had grandiose plans for the construction of the largest plant for the production of construction chemicals. The plant manager was very welcoming to the employees’ extracurricular work and weekend work. As a result, the specialist quit after two months, and the plant has been under construction for almost 10 years.

Indeed, as sociological studies show, constant overwork not only does not improve the situation at enterprises, but, on the contrary, reduces labor efficiency. At the same time, it is quite possible to reduce the number of working hours in many companies if the work of the team is properly organized.

– In my opinion, private business very quickly adapts to new conditions. Moreover, studies show that workers effectively use no more than 70% of their time, so that with the correct organization of working time, the country’s economy will not suffer, the expert is sure.

Moreover, an important factor in this matter is the emotional state of workers, Stanislav Bovt specifies. Reducing working hours will reduce professional burnout, increase stress resistance and, as practice shows, will significantly increase labor productivity.

“All experts, as if in carbon copy, are worried about the reduction in GDP and the state of the economy in the event of a reduction in working hours, but few talk about the human factor,” the expert notes. – It is necessary to change the system of approach to the main production force. If a person is interested in the end result, and not just in working out man-hours, then the GDP will grow and the economy will rise.

Meanwhile, so far the question of reducing the working week has practically not gone beyond their theoretical plane. So, according to the results survey, conducted by the SuperJob portal in October last year, the decision to switch to a shorter working week was implemented in 1% of Russian companies. Another 2% of employers have tried such a system, but then returned to the usual schedule.

Alena Bodrienko.

Photo by mobile reporter / Moskva agency