How many hours does a working week last in other countries? Ideal work week: how many hours do you need to get everything done?

When you're tired of your job, quite often the first thing that comes to mind is - how much time do I spend on work? Perhaps this is so. If you know how many hours per week people work in different countries peace. And if not, you have the opportunity to find out about it right now.

How many hours per week do they work in different countries of the world and where do the most active workers live?

If you work to live rather than the other way around, perhaps moving across the Channel would be a wise career move.

According to a UBS survey, the French worked the least in the past year: Parisians worked 1,604 hours. They are followed by the Lyons, who worked 1,631 hours each.

If hours are divided by 12 months, Parisians worked an average of 30 hours and 50 minutes per week. This is slightly less than the Lyons (31 hours 22 minutes).

France is in the process of drafting a ban on after-hours work, requiring employees to have a clear schedule that includes evenings and weekends when employees are not expected to read work-related emails.

In a recent report, the Chartered Management Institute (CMI) found that the majority of UK managers spend an extra 29 days a year. This is due to the fact that they use mobile devices for work outside working hours– that’s more than if they simply canceled their annual leave.

Of the 71 cities on the list by UBS, which analyzed the average annual workload including paid leave and public holidays across a group of 14 occupations, 18 of the cities with the shortest work weeks were in Europe.

Residents of New York, Beijing and Tokyo are more attached to work - they work 35.5, 37.7 and 39.5 hours per week, respectively.

The most active workers

But the most active workers live in Hong Kong, where working week exceeds 50 hours, which means that local residents 38% more people work than the world average, 50% more Londoners and 62% more Parisians.

These figures are a consequence of the growing demand for a new, more flexible work organization, which allows fewer hours to be spent directly in the office: thanks to new technologies, many jobs can now be carried out from almost anywhere in the world.

A recent study found that 6 out of 10 bosses believe that reducing the working day from 8 to 6 hours could have a beneficial effect on business.

However, choosing a city to live in that offers a good balance between work and play depends on whether you prefer more free time during the work week or a longer annual holiday.

While Parisians have the shortest working week, Bahrain's capital Manama offers the longest annual leave at 34 days.

Londoners are entitled to 25 days of paid holiday. This is two days more than the global average vacation duration, which is 23 days, according to UBS.

Working Hong Kong residents take 17.2 days of paid leave each year. Residents of mainland China rest even less. Shanghai is in last place in the ranking according to this parameter. Its residents go on vacation for only 7 days. It is followed by Bangkok with 9 days and Beijing with 10 days of vacation.

Kazakhstan inherited a 40-hour work week from Soviet Union. True, the workload there was a little greater, and working time was distributed a little differently: they worked 6 days for 7 hours, that is, 42 hours a week. The five-day work week was introduced in the 1960s and labor time was reduced to 41 hours a week, then to 40. This is how the 5/2 schedule, 8 hours a day, familiar to all residents of the modern CIS, appeared. Modern Kazakhstanis live and work according to this system. Moreover, few pay extra for the fact that employees have to stay late.

While Kazakhstan lives by these standards, part-time work and flexible work schedules are becoming increasingly popular throughout the world. Countries are reducing working hours in different ways: either switching to a four-day week, or shortening the working day. And the record holders for reducing working hours in the world are European countries.

In Holland The shortest working week in the world is only 29 hours. Dutch specialists are used to working 4 days a week. Both working mothers and working fathers take 3 days off in a row. Everyone is guaranteed a vacation and medical care. If the employee wants, he can reduce the number of working hours, while the wages will remain hourly. So the state takes care of the balance between personal life and work among its citizens.

In second place Denmark and 33 working hours per week. In all Scandinavian countries A flexible work schedule and 5 weeks of paid leave per year have been adopted. It is easy for employers to fire and hire new candidates, but the employees themselves are protected by law. Companies are required to pay compensation after dismissal for two years.

What follows Norway with the same indicator - 33 working hours. IN northern country parents are allowed to reduce the number of their own working hours; almost a year after the birth of a child, the young mother receives a full salary, and annual leave is at least 21 days. Partial days are normal in this country; it is customary to go home from work no later than 16:00.

The European selection is diluted Australia- It is customary to work there 34 hours a week. The government guarantees Australian workers social protection no worse than in Europe: even those who work part-time have the right to full vacation and weekend benefits.

Germans all over the world are considered to be workaholics, but in fact in Germany work no more than 35 hours a week. Moreover, the working day is structured in an unusual way for us: it is divided into 2 parts. First, the Germans work from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., then have a 3-4 hour lunch break, and in the evening the workers return to spend about three more hours at the workplace. Due to the financial crisis in the country, they prefer not to fire employees, but to reduce working hours. At the same time, the state is trying to compensate workers for lost wages.

In Ireland also work an average of 35 hours a week. Although in the late 80s the Irish worked 44 hours, that is, much more than other Europeans. There are two reasons for the trend: the desire of some specialists to switch to shorter working hours, and the underdeveloped local labor market. To work hard and get enough, many have to leave for neighboring Great Britain.

The same 35 hours is the norm for the working week for Switzerland, but with completely different incomes. The average Swiss's working day begins at 8 am and lasts until 5:30 pm, with a long break for lunch with fondue and Swiss chocolate. In many areas, flexible working hours are considered the norm, when a person comes to work when he wants, but at the same time works the allotted time. A third of the working population switched to part-time work in order to spend more time with their families.

Today I decided to collect and publish data on how long the working day, working week and working hours are in different countries of the world, and also analyze how much these indicators affect the level of economic development of countries. I was prompted to this idea by the so-called so-called revolution that recently ended in Russia. “New Year holidays”, during which many workers rested.

There are many others holidays, which are not celebrated in other countries, and I have more than once heard opinions that Russians rest too much, and they should, they say, work. After delving into the statistics, I came to the conclusion that this is all an absolute fallacy: in fact, Russians are among the people who work the hardest in the world! Well, residents of neighboring CIS countries are also not far behind. And now more details...

There is an international Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which calculates and compares statistical data in a variety of areas. So, among other things, she keeps a tally of actual working hours worked (including official part-time jobs and overtime).

According to OECD data, in 2015 the average resident of Russia spent 1,978 hours at work! This means that he worked 247 8-hour working days, that is, he worked all working days of the year according to the norm, without shortened days and without any vacation at all. And this is only according to official data! Is it worth mentioning how much people recycle unofficially?
According to this indicator, Russia took 6th place in the world in 2015. The top five countries where workers worked the most hours looked like this:

Mexico.
Costa Rica.
South Korea.
Greece.
Chile.

Please note: these are predominantly “middle-level” and “below-average” countries, not the most developed, but not the most backward. In general, it is not entirely clear why many Asian countries, where working hard is considered in good form, people basically don’t rest and don’t take vacations. Nevertheless, the report is just that. Do you know which countries, according to OECD data, had the shortest working hours?

Germany.
Netherlands.
Norway.
Denmark.
France.

In general, the entire top ten is occupied by European countries. For example, the working time of the average resident of Germany in 2015 was 1371 hours, which is a third less than in Russia! In fact, all European countries included in the top 10 countries with minimum working hours are at very high level development.

Where did such a difference between the hours worked by Russians and residents of Western Europe come from? There are 3 main reasons:

Shorter working hours and working weeks.
Longer holidays.
A more strict approach to overtime and work outside of school hours.
Moreover, interestingly, the length of the working day and working week does not have the strongest impact on the actual working time worked in the year. Because according to the results of the OECD study, it is clear that countries with approximately the same length of the working day and working week can take diametrically opposed positions in terms of the actual working time of the average worker.

Let's look at the length of the working day and working week in different countries of the world:

The Netherlands has the shortest working week in the world. A working day is on average 7.5 hours, a working week is 27 hours.
France, Ireland – working week 35 hours.
Denmark – working day 7.3 hours, working week – 37.5 hours. It is noteworthy that the average hourly salary in Denmark is 30% higher than in the EU as a whole - 37.6 euros per hour.
Germany – working week 38 hours. Despite the fact that Germans are traditionally considered workaholics, annual working hours are the lowest in the world!
Russia, Ukraine – working day 8 hours, working week – 40 hours. However, due to overtime (even official!) and short, often unobserved vacations, these countries are among the ten countries with the largest working hours per year.
USA – maximum working week – 40 hours. In fact, in the private sector, workers work an average of 34.6 hours per week.

Japan – 40 hour work week. Everyone has heard about the workaholism of the Japanese, however, the official working week there is no different from the Russian one. In this country, it is customary to unofficially stay late at work to advance your career; this is not included in official statistics. In fact, the work week often lasts up to 50 hours.
UK – working week – 43.7 hours.
Greece – working week – 43.7 hours, actual working hours worked – the maximum in Europe.

Mexico, Thailand, India – working week up to 48 hours, six days.
China - average working day - 10 hours, average working week - 60 hours. The lunch break in China is 20 minutes, and the average vacation is 10 days.
In addition to the length of the working day and extracurricular work, the total working time is also influenced by the duration of vacation, including European countries ah, with this, too, things are better than in Russia, Ukraine and other countries of the post-Soviet space.

For example, the average duration of paid leave in different countries of the world is:
Austria – 6 weeks of vacation (from 25 years old);
Finland – vacation up to 8 weeks (including “bonuses” up to 18 days for long service at one enterprise);
France – up to 9.5 weeks of vacation;
UK, Germany – 4 weeks of vacation;
The average in Europe is 25 working days of vacation (5 weeks);
Russia – 4 weeks of vacation (28 days);
Ukraine – 24 days of vacation;

USA - there are no legal regulations on the duration of vacation - at the discretion of the employer;
Japan - 18 days a year, taking a vacation is considered bad form, on average the Japanese take 8 days a year on vacation;
India - 12 days a year;
China – 11 days a year;
Mexico – 6 days a year;
Philippines - 5 days a year (minimum).

As for the “extended” New Year holidays, in Western countries they actually turn out to be even longer. Although there are not many official holidays there, in reality, already from December 20, business activity there is practically reduced to zero; from December 25, almost all enterprises close, and open from January 9-10.

In general, if we consider the trend, working hours in most countries of the world are gradually decreasing. In the early 1900s, residents of many countries devoted 3,000 hours to work annually (!), but now the global average is 1,800 hours, and in the most productive and economically developed countries it is even lower.

Back in 1930, economist John Keynes, author of the famous theory of Keynesianism, predicted that in 100 years, in 2030, the working week would last an average of 15 hours. Of course, he was most likely mistaken in the numbers, but not in the trend: working hours have indeed been steadily declining since then.

If you analyze labor data provided by the OECD, you can clearly see that for a strong economy you need to work not hard, but efficiently. They also have such an indicator as productivity of working hours, so, for example, if we compare two European countries with maximum and minimum working hours - Greece and Germany, then in Germany productivity is 70% higher than in Greece. This example perfectly demonstrates the now popular expression: “you need to work not 12 hours a day, but with your head!”

Fans of workaholism often cite Asian countries as an example, for example, China and India, where working hours are very long, and these countries demonstrate high rates of economic growth. I propose to look at Asia from a slightly different perspective.

It is in Asia that there is a special term “karoshi”, which means “death from overworking”. Because such cases are far from uncommon there: people literally die at their workplaces, since their body cannot withstand such a heavy load. For example, in Japan there is official statistics karoshi, and many believe that it is underestimated.

In general, I think that in terms of the length of the working day, working week and working time in general, we need to focus on Europe, and not on Asia. The economies of European countries demonstrate perfectly that labor productivity is much more important than hours worked. Here are just the most important advantages of a shorter working day and working week:

A person gets less tired at work, which means he can work more efficiently;
Limited working hours leave no room for so-called distractions. time wasters - the employee is fully involved in the work process;
The shorter the working time, the stronger man can concentrate on work;
The employee spends more time at home, with his family, with relatives and friends, devotes more time to his hobbies, relaxes, which means he has more energy and strength for work;
The person who works less has less problems with health, which means he again has more strength and energy to do the work.

Summarizing all of the above, I can conclude: you need to take a closer look at positive examples and maintain a course towards reducing the working day, working week, and working time in general. To begin with, at least eliminate constant overtime from practice. Because when work turns into slavery, I assure you, this will not lead to anything good, neither for employers nor for employees. Normal, civilized labor relations will definitely contribute to increased labor efficiency, and everyone will be better off that way.

In conclusion, for the sake of credibility, I’ll give a personal example: I spend less than half of my traditional working time working on this site. And it didn’t make him any worse, right? And I achieved quite good results. That is, to achieve success, you don’t have to work hard. Be sure to work efficiently!

Now you know what the working day, working week and working time are in the countries of the world, what results it brings, you see my conclusions and you can make your own. I hope that this information will be useful to you, perhaps making you look differently at things that seemed obvious.

We also present ILO data*

How long is the working week in other countries?

In most countries of the world the working week continues, as in Russian Federation, from Monday to Friday.

In some countries, days off are days other than Saturday and Sunday. So, in Israel the main day off is Saturday, the work week begins on Sunday and ends on Thursday or Friday afternoon. The standard work week is 43 hours. The working day is 8 hours. In all new states that were formed after the collapse of the USSR, the working week is 40 hours.

And in Muslim countries, the main day off is Friday. The working week lasts from Saturday to Wednesday (Algeria and Saudi Arabia), from Saturday to Thursday (Iran), or from Sunday to Thursday (Egypt, Syria, Iraq, United Arab Emirates).

The Chinese are considered the hardest workers in the world. In China there is a six-day workweek and a 10-hour workday. True, there is vacation in the Middle Kingdom, but it is only 10 days, and the lunch break is 20 minutes.

Length of the working week in different countries:

Netherlands - 30.5 hours.
Finland - 33 hours.
France - 35 hours.
Ireland - 35.3 hours.
USA - 34.5 hours (the working week was shortened due to the global economic crisis).
Denmark - 37 hours. In government agencies, working hours include a daily 30-minute lunch break.
Germany - 38 hours.
Norway - 39 hours.
Bulgaria, Estonia, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Romania - 40 hours.
Greece, Austria, Israel - 43 hours.
UK - average 43.7 hours.
Argentina - 44 hours, of which four are on Saturday.
Mexico, Peru, India, Colombia, Nepal, Thailand - 48 hours.
Japan - 50 hours.
China - 60 hours.

*The International Labor Organization (ILO) is a specialized UN agency dealing with regulatory issues labor relations. Created in 1919 on the basis of the Versailles Peace Treaty as a structural subdivision of the League of Nations. As of 2012, 185 states are members of the ILO. The organization's headquarters is located in Geneva.

430 days ago

It is generally accepted that the length of the working week in the Russian Federation is insufficient and that Russians rest too much - especially on the New Year and May holidays. Asians are set as an example for Russians, for whom the desire to leave work early is considered bad manners. However, are Russian people really so lazy and reluctant to work? International studies say the opposite: according to their results, Russia is one of the ten countries whose citizens spend the most time at work.

How long should Russians work?

Length of the working week according to the Labor Code in 2017 in Russia is 40 hours. In Russia, a “five-day week” is adopted, with days off on Saturday and Sunday. Duration working day for a five-day period it should not exceed 8 hours. Such a schedule is usually called normalized. The Labor Code of the Russian Federation also mentions other types of schedules.

Irregular. The enterprise resorts to irregular hours in case of emergency, so such work is exclusively episodic in nature.

Irregular work cannot be the norm in an organization!

Irregular hours require overtime work. In order to involve an employee in overtime work, the employer is obliged to provide him with written consent. The Labor Code limits the duration of overtime work: a maximum of 120 overtime hours must be accumulated per year. There is another restriction: the employer does not have the right to force an employee to overwork more than 4 hours for 2 days in a row.

Flexible. Flexible work hours are mentioned in Art. 102 of the Labor Code. With this type of schedule, the employee has the right to choose which days he will have days off and what time he will come to work. At the same time, he must fulfill his weekly quota one way or another.

In the USSR, a flexible schedule appeared in the 80s as a privilege for women with young children. Over time, flexible scheduling in Russia has become a common practice.

Removable. The shift schedule is used by those enterprises whose production process exceeds the permissible working day of a Russian citizen. This type of schedule is used by security companies, factories, and convenience stores. The norms of the shift schedule are reflected in Art. 110 Labor Code of the Russian Federation. According to this article, an employee has the right to uninterrupted rest of at least 42 hours after a shift and cannot be involved in work for 2 shifts in a row.

Duration of work shift Labor Code not limited.

Who has the right to work less?

The right to a shorter working week in the Russian Federation is enjoyed by:

Teaching staff. The working week of teaching staff is 36 hours - according to Order No. 1601 of the Ministry of Education and Science. This applies not only to school teachers and university teachers, but also to counselors, labor inspectors, and methodologists.

Medical workers. Length of working week medical workers according to Art. 350 TK is 39 hours. However, depending on the doctor's specialty, the work week may be even shorter. For example, dentists work 33 hours, employees of tuberculosis dispensaries and pathologists – 30 hours, medical workers who carry out gamma irradiation – 24 hours.

Minors. The length of the working week for a minor depends on his age. If a child is under 16 years of age, he is prohibited from working more than 24 hours. For teenagers aged 16 to 18 years, the maximum working week is 35 hours.

What about other countries?

The “champion” in terms of working week length is quite predictably China. In China, people work 60 hours (!) – 6 days a week. It is worth saying that a Chinese vacation lasts only 10 days (once a year), and the lunch break lasts only 20 minutes.

Countries such as Mexico, Thailand, India, Nepal, Colombia, Peru can boast of long working weeks - in all of these countries citizens have to spend 48 hours a week working (the “six-day work week” is accepted everywhere). The main workaholics in Europe are de jure the British, who work 43 hours and 42 minutes, and de facto the Greeks, whose weeks are slightly shorter, but overtime is more common.

The shortest working week is in the Netherlands. The Dutch work only 27 hours - 7.5 daily with a “four-day workday”; this is significantly less than in other countries. Citizens of France and Ireland should be happy - they are supposed to work 35 hours a week. In countries that, in the minds of Russians, are examples of workaholism - in Japan and Germany - citizens are also not legally required to work a lot: Germans work for 38 hours, and the Japanese, like Russians, for 40. Another thing is that for the Japanese, overtime work is norm; in fact, in the Land of the Rising Sun they spend approximately 50 hours on work.

What conclusions can be drawn based on the length of the working week in different countries of the world? There is only one conclusion: working more does not mean working better. The number of countries where people spend the least amount of time on work includes developed countries of Western Europe (Netherlands, France, Norway). The longest working week is in developing countries Latin America And Southeast Asia, where a lot of people live below the poverty line defined by international organizations. It turns out that a long working week is a sign of low development of a country.

According to statistics from the OECD (international Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development), Russia, despite average duration The working week ranks 6th in the world in terms of time that citizens actually spend on work - primarily due to constant overtime. Perhaps these alarming statistics will make legislators think about finally introducing a 4-day working week in Russia. Rumors about such an intention have been persistently circulating since 2014.

The European Union allows countries to determine the length of the working week themselves.

In France, some workers work 35 hours a week, from Monday to Friday. The lunch break is determined depending on the collective agreement at the enterprise. At the same time, in a number of professions, for example in the service sector, there are often contracts that imply a 39-hour work week. Special conditions are provided for doctors and junior medical personnel- their working week in case of duty may slightly exceed 40 hours per week.

In France, the introduction of a 35-hour work week was highly controversial in the nineties, and some politicians still want to revise working hours upward.

In Denmark the system is in many ways close to the French one. By law, the working week is 37.5 hours. Many civil servants are in a privileged position, since the half-hour daily lunch break is also included in their working hours. Thus, employees in such positions work only 34.5 hours per week.

In the UK, the length of the working week depends on the contract - it can be 35 or 40 hours per week. For people who work shifts, the number of hours worked may vary depending on the week, but should not exceed 48 hours.

Duration of work in Asian countries

A rather specific situation has developed in Japan. A standard work contract requires 40 hours of activity per week. However, in reality, adjustments are made to this schedule. How much time a person spends at work often determines his career advancement. Therefore, even office workers work an extra half of Saturday, and also work late during the week in the evenings. Thus, the working week in some cases can reach 50 hours or more, and extra work not always paid.

The Japanese government views long working hours as a problem and is trying to combat this practice among companies.

In Thailand, a typical work week lasts 6 days, with only Sunday being a day off. Depending on the contract, people work 44 to 48 hours a week. At the same time, the offices of Western companies in this country most often work according to the five-day workday standard in Europe and the United States with a forty-hour work week.

In India, most workers work 48 hours a week with one day off. Among employees, especially in government institutions, the work schedule is more frequent - about 44 hours a week. There are also contracts under which work is carried out only 40 hours a week.