The job market has witnessed a gradual uptick in the promotion of 4-day workweeks, albeit still constituting a small fraction of employment offerings. From a meagre 0.1% in September 2019, job postings featuring a 4-day workweek have marginally risen to nearly 0.3% in September 2023, as highlighted in a recent report from Indeed’s Hiring Lab. Curiously, the surge in these postings is more pronounced in traditional in-person sectors rather than industries favouring remote work. Notably, veterinary services, dentistry, and manufacturing have seen a substantial increase in advertisements advocating for a 4-day workweek, a demand echoed by numerous striking workers.
While the popularity of the 4-day workweek is on the rise, economists Allison Shrivastava and Nick Bunker from Indeed’s Hiring Lab suggest that it has a considerable distance to cover before becoming a commonplace offering. They ponder whether this trend will persist as a distinctive benefit for select in-person roles or transform into a widespread expectation among job seekers or a common negotiation point in union discussions. However, the economists emphasize that a standardized 4-day workweek, particularly for office workers, remains a distant prospect.
Analyzing specific sectors, the veterinary services domain takes the lead, with a growth of 1.39 percentage points in advertisements featuring a 4-day workweek over the past four years. Dentistry follows closely with a 0.9 percentage point increase, and industrial engineering, driving, and architecture exhibit a growth of around 0.3 percentage points. In the manufacturing and production sector, postings endorsing a 4-day workweek have surged by 40% since September 2019, reaching a modest increase from 0.5% to 0.7%. Notably, leaders in the United Auto Workers have pressed for a 4-day workweek as part of their negotiations and strikes against major automakers.
However, it’s essential to acknowledge that a 4-day schedule might not suit every worker. They may aim to provide flexibility to both deskless factory workers and desked workers, but it is important to underline the nuanced challenges in implementing such arrangements across diverse work environments.
