New study pinpoints ‘optimal’ length of a regular working week

In a new working paper, the National Bureau of Economic has determined that 37 hours is the most ‘optimal’ length of a working week. It comes after years of experimentation with hours and formats to better cater for employees.

Are you a morning person? Find yourself more productive in the afternoon? Or do you prefer to work late into the night?

Whatever your preference, it’s safe to say that most of us have our own routines and optimal working hours. For big companies with hundreds of employees it can be easy to sideline this reality and force everyone across the board to operate at the same time.

In fact, the standard nine-to-five model has been practiced around the world for over a century. As we mentioned in our recent Gen Z newsletter on ‘taskmasking’, it’s a system that was upended as a result of the pandemic in 2020, with most of us adopting a new hybrid system that prioritised home offices.

Now, in a new working paper shared by the National Bureau of Economic Research, Duke University economists have analysed data provided from Germany to determine what the most efficient workweek looks like. Their conclusion? 37 hours.

The paper draws on findings from the German Socio-Economic Panel, which asked regular people how they felt about choosing their own working hours if it directly impacted how much money they made.

Based on the responses provided, more than two-thirds of those sampled could be described as ‘overworked,’ meaning their ideal hours were less than the actual amount of hours they worked.

Interestingly, according to additional data used in the study, Europeans are most likely to want to work less, while those in the US frequently prefer increased hours.

All of this information comes as companies lightly experiment with four-day working weeks.

Government employees in Tokyo were recently given the option to work one day less per week, for example, while similar programmes have been launched in Germany and Australia. Some have tried to get the ball rolling in the US, but that remains mostly a pipe dream for now.