Is it Feasible to Reduce the Duration of the Working Day?

Before the pandemic, there was already a conversation about the effects of stressful and undignified working conditions on the mental health of employees. Now, in post-pandemic times, when we are experiencing a return to offices, a combination of in-person, remote and hybrid work, stress and burnout among workers have worsened. The consequences for organizations include reduced productivity, talent shortages, motivation and retention problems, absenteeism and resignations.

In fact, occupational phenomena, such as burnout, have worsened, which is related to highly competitive work environments, long work hours and increased stress. In addition to this, many workers experience the difficulty of reconciling work at home with family and home needs or, also, because they feel disoriented and constantly worried about the lack of experience in remote work and in the use of technology to perform their job well. 

In addition to the implementation of the federal government’s legal norm NOM 035 to prevent and address psychosocial risk factors in the country's organizations, and norm NOM 037 that regulates the working conditions of people who telework, there have been different initiatives in Mexico to care for the mental well-being of associates and to promote decent working conditions, such as the approved labor reform that increases the number of paid vacation days for all employees after completing one year of work and the proposal to reduce workday hours, which will be discussed in the Chamber of Deputies for approval starting in September 2023.

The reduction of the workday hours is already a reality in Latin American countries like Ecuador, Venezuela and Chile; the latter approved, last April, the reduction of the weekly workday length from 45 to 40 hours. Together with Ecuador, these two countries have the shortest working week in the region. 

Thus, the reduction of working hours is a global trend to guarantee that people enjoy a better quality of work and, consequently, have a better work-life balance. 

It is for this reason that, at OCCMundial, we took on the task of investigating, through our surveys of users of our online platform, the perception of workers regarding the reduction of working hours.

Of a sample of around 8,000 users who participated in our survey, 94% said they were in favor of the initiative to reduce working hours. Although the majority is in favor, 67% consider it unlikely that companies will adopt this new scheme, 11% say that it is impossible for them to do so and only 22% see it as very feasible.

It should be remembered that one of the reasons for this initiative is that Mexicans work the most hours per week in Latin America, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD); in this regard, 44% of the employees participating in the survey assure that they work more than 48 hours a week, 34% work 48 hours and 22% work less than 48 hours a week.

In this way, 88% of those surveyed stated that the reduction would have a positive impact in the country, 8% considered that there would be no change and 4% thought that it would have a negative impact. Regarding the effects on productivity and the development of companies in Mexico, 8 out of 10 employees who participated in the survey stated that this initiative would have a positive impact; 11% indicated that the organizations would remain the same, 5% said that the impact on business development would be negative and another 5% did not know.

On the other side of the coin, Coparmex, a confederation that represents businesspeople from all sectors, spoke out against the initiative, saying that a five-day work week is not convenient for organizations and that this reform would cause losses and damages of around MX$380 billion (US$22 billion) per year to the country. In addition, it maintains that the impact on  companies would be greater, since they would have to allocate more resources to hiring personnel and paying overtime, and it would have an impact on the prices of goods and services for consumers, which would lead to greater inflation. 

Continuing with our survey, the employees surveyed listed the benefits and challenges of approving the reduction in working hours. As for the benefits, they highlighted the balance of work and personal life, improvement in their quality of life, reduction of work exhaustion, reduction of stress and an increase in their productivity. Among the challenges they would face would be reorganizing their work schedules, resistance to change, making use of technology to optimize time and increase productivity, the possible reduction in salary and the additional costs that organizations could have. 

In fact, salary is a concern for associates , since 36% of them consider that the company in which they work would make changes to their compensation if they work only 40 hours a week, 29% do not believe that they will, and 35% do not know if they would make salary adjustments. However, we should remember that if the initiative is approved, no employer would have the right to reduce the salary of its employees because it would break the law, since, according to the Federal Labor Law, the employer can only reduce the salary of the worker if the same employee accepts it. 

We hope that the discussion of this initiative will resume in September. If approved, it will most likely result in  changes and adaptations to meet its objective of promoting better employment conditions, but it must also stipulate that the changes be  gradual so that organizations have enough time to adapt and consider strategies to take care of their resources.