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IHT: Western Europe slowly comes to grips with working Will we see longer working hours in Germany? Is this a good or a bad thing? Leave your comments... A colleague writes: Well well well … welcome to the real working world! I heard the Germany is considering lengthening the work hours to 40 hours instead of the leisurely 35 hours with plenty of Holidays! And the article also said that Germany work hours is 18% less than the American! ... less beer time? And a summary of my response: It's such a shame because the Germans have a good work/life balance. I think this will dilute their time at work, being made to work longer for the same pay, thus demotivating them. Longer working hours doesn't mean more productive workers (I just need to look at some of my colleagues in other countries -- they may work longer, but they're not as productive). It also doesn't help our still-flagging economy -- with high unemployment and plenty of skilled workers looking for jobs, why lengthen the working week? Is the cost of adding a couple of hours to someone's day and paying unemployment benefit to 10% of the country really that much cheaper than employing another worker and having 2 employed, motivated, happy people? |
May 2004
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