Public sector as pioneer: shorter working weeks as the new gold standard
    
    Jones, Phil, Calvert Jump, Robert ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2967-512X and Kikuchi, Lukas
  
(2020)
Public sector as pioneer: shorter working weeks as the new gold standard.
    Technical Report.
    Autonomy, Hampshire.
  
  
	
  
Preview  | 
            
              
PDF (Technical report)
 30265_JUMP_Public_sector_as_pioneer_2.pdf - Published Version Download (391kB) | Preview  | 
          
Abstract
• A shorter working week in the public sector (with no loss in pay) is badly needed: burn out, work-related poor mental health and bad work-life balance plague public sector staff across organisations.
• A 32-hour week in the public sector is not just desirable for worker wellbeing and for reducing the costs of burn out and presenteeism; a 32-hour week would also create hundreds of thousands of jobs and establish a new standard for all employment in the UK.
▪ It would create between 300,000 and 500,000 new full-time
equivalent jobs in the sector.
• Public sector employment takes up a relatively high proportion of
employment in Wales, the North of England and Scotland – entailing that a 32-hour working week would benefit regions that have felt the hardship of austerity most.
• Such a policy is eminently affordable and achievable: on Autonomy’s conservative calculations a 32-hour week could cost around £9bn, but the true figure could be much lower at around £5.4bn.
▪ This figure is only 6% of the public sector employment salary bill
and just over 1% of the total government spending budget.
• In addition to the public sector pioneering through its own working practices, we outline how procurement strategies aimed at private sector partners can encourage broader change across the UK labour market.
| Item Type: | Monograph (Technical Report) | 
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | Public sector, working hours, four day week | 
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD28 Management. Industrial Management H Social Sciences > HJ Public Finance  | 
				
| Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group: | Faculty of Business Faculty of Business > Department of International Business & Economics  | 
				
| Related URLs: | |
| Last Modified: | 20 Jul 2021 09:19 | 
| URI: | http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/30265 | 
Actions (login required)
![]()  | 
        View Item | 
Downloads
Downloads per month over past year
 Tools
 Tools