CNN Reports 4-Day Work Week In Iceland Has Been A Triumph

On October 25, CNN published an article stating that “Iceland’s economy is outperforming most European peers after the nationwide introduction of a shorter working week with no loss in pay.” The news has been republished by dozens of other national and regional media outlets.

CNN’s article cites the research by an independent think tank Autonomy which published their findings last Friday.

Key findings of the report include:

• The offer of shorter hours has been widespread. In the two years prior to being surveyed, more than half (59%) of workers were offered reduced working hours.

• These changes have had significant worker inputs: in the vast majority (80%) of instances, workers say they were consulted on how reduced hours were implemented in their workplace.

• A large majority of Icelandic workers (78%) are satisfied with their present working time.

• In the public sector, 81% of state-level workers and 82% of municipal workers were satisfied with their working time, while the satisfaction rate was slightly lower — 77% — in the private sector.

• Focusing on those who have seen their hours reduced in the last two years, 62% of workers report being more satisfied with their working time.

• In workplaces with higher proportions of women in the workforce, percentages of those indicating greater satisfaction were much higher at 70%, compared to 54% in more male-dominated workplaces.

• 97% of workers thought that shorter working hours had made it easier to balance work with their private life, or at least kept the balance the same as before (with more than half, 52%, thinking it had improved).

Shortened work week versus four-day week

Between 2015 and 2019, trials of a shorter working week took place in Iceland’s public sector, with employees working 35-36 hours per week without any reduction in pay. These trials involved 2,500 people, representing over 1% of Iceland’s working population at the time, so the initiative was not applied nationwide. Many companies now support Stytting vinnuvikunnar, or a shortened work week. The VR Union, for example, states that a reduction in working hours for VR members was agreed upon, reducing hours by 9 minutes per day for full-time employees starting in January 2020. This reduction equals 45 minutes per week, or 3 hours and 15 minutes per month, with no salary reduction. The goal is to create a more family-friendly labour market. Therefore, CNN article likely confuses a shorter work week with the concept of a four-day week.

The article also claims that Iceland has one of the lowest unemployment rates in Europe, despite Statistics Iceland recent findings showing that the unemployment rate doubled month-over-month in September, reaching 5.2% after seasonal adjustments.

The article sparked public discussion, with several locals on Reddit commenting, “I wish we only worked 4 days.”

I'm curious about Iceland’s 4-day work week—locals
byu/shura762 inIceland