Vermont’s senior U.S. senator is introducing legislation to reduce the number of hours the average person works every week. Independent Bernie Sanders says it’s time to transition from a 40-hour to a 32-hour standard workweek.
Senator Sanders chairs the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and said a hearing on reducing workforce hours had not been held since 1955.
“Today in America, 28-and-a-half million Americans, 18% of our workforce, now work over 60 hours a week and 40% of employees in America now work at least 50 hours a week. The sad reality is Americans now work more hours than the people of any other wealthy nation.”
Sanders’ bill would amend the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, reducing the nation’s standard workweek from 40 hours to 32 hours.
Sanders ‘office says it would ”Protect workers’ pay and benefits to ensure that a reduction in the workweek does not cause a loss in pay.” During his hearing, Sanders said such a change is not a radical idea.
“Our economy is going to be transformed through Artificial Intelligence and robotics,” Sanders said. “Do we continue the trend that technology only benefits the people on top or do we demand that these transformational changes benefit working people? And one of the benefits must be a lower work week, a 32-hour workweek. This is not a radical idea. France, the seventh largest economy in the world, has a 35-hour workweek and its considering a 32-hour workweek. Norway and Denmark, their work week is about 37 hours and Belgium has already adopted a four-day work week.”
Louisiana Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, the ranking member, said if Sanders’ proposal is passed it would be catastrophic.
“There is a reason that no other country has a mandatory 32-hour workweek,” noted Cassidy. “When Japan shortened its workweek economic output plummeted 20 percent. Belgium, as the Chair notes, has a four-day workweek. But those workers work 40-hours within those four days. Now AI and other technologies have the potential to dramatically increase economic productivity. But a mom-and-pop restaurant is not really seeing increased productivity from AI. And if we require them to pay for a 40-hour workweek for 32 hours of work, how will it turn out for that mom-and-pop restaurant? A mandatory 32-hour workweek is bad policy.”
Retired University of Vermont Professor of Economics Art Woolf says the proposal would not accomplish what he thinks Sanders intends.
"Everybody’s pay would go down by 25% because they’re working 25% fewer hours,” Woolf calculates. “If his intention is that every business has to pay their workers the same amount that they were making before then everybody gets basically a 30% wage increase. That would kind of be inflationary and not to mention disruptive to every business in terms of their planning and how they work and what they do. So, it would be pretty bad for just about everybody. Forcing every employer in the United States to do that would be extremely disruptive.”
Woolf doubts the bill will be enacted.
“It’s a huge change and I don’t think there’s much chance of that bill going forward,” Woolf predicts. “Maybe it’ll get voted out of the committee. But I don’t think there’s any chance at all that it would pass in its present form or anything near it.”
A companion bill has been introduced in the House by California Democrat Mark Takano.
