Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Average annual hours worked per country

stats.oecd.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 113 posts

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#81

Post by toomanybeersies »

stevesimmons wrote: post #48
germinalphrase wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you attribute this higher rate of part time work to a strong social welfare system in the Netherlands or to some other factor?

Here are some "anecdata" from my 6 years working in the Netherlands: * 4 day weeks are very common: I worked for a Dutch Bank for 3 years. Virtually all the Dutch "full time" staff worked 4 day weeks. The deal was work 10% less (36 instead of 40 hours), extend the working day a notional one hour on Monday to Thursday, and take every Friday off. Not bad for a 10% reduction in salary. And since everyone does it - even…

What time do cafes usually close in Amsterdam?

Because it seems that the standard in Australia and NZ is for cafes to open early and close early, at around 3pm or 4pm.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#82

Post by toomanybeersies »

kuerbel wrote: post #28
aserafini wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live and work in Germany but I am not German. I believe the work culture here is: if you are having to work outside core hours, you are ineffective and should have managed your workload better. Consequently I believe there is greater focus on continuously doing the most important task during work rather than occupying oneself with 'busy work' that is prevalent in many other work cultures.

I live in Germany as well (I'm Swiss), and people usually get free time in exchange for overtime and not money around here. I think that explains it better, because overtime is pretty prevalent - at least in some jobs. Others not so much. You usually don't have to work more than your usual 8 hours/day in a super market. As a software engineer however...

I really wish flexitime was a thing in more countries. I'd happily work 45 hours a week in exchange for an extra couple of weeks of annual leave. 4 weeks (Australian standard leave) just isn't long enough for a good trip anywhere, especially since you usually end up burning a week of leave through the year for random things.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#83

Post by EZ-E »

hectormalot wrote: post #4
betadreamer wrote: post #2

Keep in mind that this is showing the "reported" hours, which can be misleading. For example it shows that people in US works more than Japan but I know for a fact that people in Japan works A LOT more. However, since it is a cultural thing and they expect you to work long hours, no one reports overtime. I even heard that you can get fired if you report it.

Also keep in mind that the numbers are not corrected for part-time vs full-time figures. e.g. my country (the Netherlands) is listed as 1439 hours vs Mexico 2257 hours annually per worker. You might come to the conclusion that people in Mexico work must longer than in the Netherlands. However, only 17% of people in Mexico work part-time, vs 37% in the Netherlands. Countries with low participation of part-time workers…

I think that also explains why Germany is so low on the list

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#84

Post by JimmyAustin »

hrktb wrote: post #78
betadreamer wrote: post #2

Keep in mind that this is showing the "reported" hours, which can be misleading. For example it shows that people in US works more than Japan but I know for a fact that people in Japan works A LOT more. However, since it is a cultural thing and they expect you to work long hours, no one reports overtime. I even heard that you can get fired if you report it.

> people in Japan work A LOT more No they don’t. Not your average part-time worker at the supermarket registry, nor your mostly stay at home mother doing 4h a day at the convinience store. This study is not just about high profile workers, it’s for the global working population, “blue collar” and part timers included.

As with most surveys, the average isn't very insightful, and you need to dive further in to the distribution to learn anything. I imagine Japan has a bimodal distribution split between on and off the salarymen track.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#85

Post by shanghaiaway »

betadreamer wrote: post #2

Keep in mind that this is showing the "reported" hours, which can be misleading. For example it shows that people in US works more than Japan but I know for a fact that people in Japan works A LOT more. However, since it is a cultural thing and they expect you to work long hours, no one reports overtime. I even heard that you can get fired if you report it.

> I know for a fact that people in Japan works A LOT more

Source? None? Ok, let's use the on linked here that contradicts you.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#86

Post by mercutio2 »

ithkuil wrote: post #42
moate wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why would you need to correct for that? If more of the labor force works part time, more of the labor force is working fewer hours. Are you assuming these part time workers are carrying multiple jobs which aren't being listed in sum (eg 20 Hours/week at Job A, 10 Hours/week at job B for 30 hours, instead of 15 if each job is separate?)

To the other extreme: why would you correct for unemployment (which is what happens if you measure worked hours only for those who have a job)? After all an unemployed person is a "part-time" worker where the fraction of time spent working is exactly zero.

Agreed. Hours worked per prime-age inhabitant, would be very interesting.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#88

Post by shanghaiaway »

foobaw wrote: post #3
betadreamer wrote: post #2

Keep in mind that this is showing the "reported" hours, which can be misleading. For example it shows that people in US works more than Japan but I know for a fact that people in Japan works A LOT more. However, since it is a cultural thing and they expect you to work long hours, no one reports overtime. I even heard that you can get fired if you report it.

Exactly what I wanted to say. I know it shows Korea as the 3rd most, but I feel like they should be higher on the list. Most don't report overtime and just do their work because it has become the convention and it wouldn't look good to their bosses.

Research like this exists because otherwise people would bring up what they "feel" the facts are.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#89

Post by shanghaiaway »

gascan wrote: post #71
acd wrote: post #52

Working less hours is better. Then you can spend more time with people that matter family and friends. There is no point in working much just for the sake of it. Also working hours vs gdp should show that you can work less hours and still have a high gdp.

Nah I think what you'd really want to look at is something like YOY GDP growth vs hours worked, or something like that. If a country is experiencing large gains in output, working more hours is paying great dividends and raising everyone's standard of living, etc. You're not working just for the sake of working. On the other hand if output is stable, that's a time to start spending more time with family.

Increase working hours in the US by 10% across the board and the GDP will likely not increase at all.

Re: Average annual hours worked per country

#90

Post by getoj »

betadreamer wrote: post #2

Keep in mind that this is showing the "reported" hours, which can be misleading. For example it shows that people in US works more than Japan but I know for a fact that people in Japan works A LOT more. However, since it is a cultural thing and they expect you to work long hours, no one reports overtime. I even heard that you can get fired if you report it.

A couple of people have made the point about full-time versus part-time work in Japan, which is actually covered by this [1] MHLW report on overwork.

The graph on the right on Page 1 has an orange line at the top representing the total hours worked per year by an average "ordinary" (meaning full-time) worker.

The red line below that represents the average part-time worker.

The dates are from Heisei 6 (1994) through 25 (2013).

So we can see that as of 2013, the average full-time worker in Japan reported that they worked 2018 hours a year. I'd be interested in seeing comparable statistics for the US and other countries.

[1] https://www.mhlw.go.jp/file/05-Shingikai-11201000-Roudoukiju... (in Japanese)

EDIT TO ADD: It's also worth noting that the increasing blue bars in the right-hand graph represent an increase in the percentage of people in part-time work, which corresponds to a decrease in overall (full- and part-time) work hours in the graph on the left (the blue line). So the arguments about a higher percentage of part-time workers being significant in lowering the average seem to be right.

Post reply on HN