25 ms·

Japan's government plans to encourage 4-day workweek, but experts split

881 points by m3at 5y ago

post_break 5y ago
Will this be one of those Japanese quirks just like 5pm, where they say 4 day work week, but then still work 5-6 work weeks? Like sure, you can leave at 5, but do you want to be the person to leave at 5?
ekianjo 5y ago
Why does the government need to be involved if employers actually get better productivity in the first place? Let employers experiment by themselves and see what works best. Another typical example of top-to-bottom leadership in Japan.
- culopatin 5y ago
  Perhaps because without the intervention, they weren’t doing it.
  - ekianjo 5y ago
    Then you probably need to ask why.
- kumarvvr 5y ago
  If the government doesn't make laws that define broad principles, capitalism will eat you alive. Employers are greedy and evil. Their focus is profit maximization. Not employee well being. Given the chance, do you really think employers will even give vacation days to employees? No way. They will want you to work 24/7 if the govt. is ok with it.
  - throw123123123 5y ago
    Where do you think the salary comes from in the beginning?
    - kumarvvr 5y ago
      At the beginning of civilized society? From the government itself. Then it slowly evolves into capital flow to people closely connected to the government (aristocrats, royalty, etc) and then to common people through banks. You seem to imply that for any entrepreneurship, you need to have no worker protections at all. But that is simply false.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - ekianjo 5y ago
        > At the beginning of civilized society? From the government itself. You seem to have no understanding that powerful states is a VERY recent invention in History.
      - throw123123123 5y ago
        > From the government itself There is no government possible without incomes that support it. You got this exactly the other way around.
  - ekianjo 5y ago
    > If the government doesn't make laws that define broad principles, capitalism will eat you alive. Has it? Levels of life of the whole world are on the rise for the past 20 years at least - if you want to make that argument the current data does not support that at all.
    - boardwaalk 5y ago
      Look up the industrial revolution and labor laws. Y'know, when things like child labor were outlawed. Good things, I hope you will agree.
  - kwere 5y ago
    ford & Westinghouse disagree with you, but that is possible only in non-feudalistic sectors and benevolent masters
- rvba 5y ago
  Then you end up with 996 system that is good for employers but not for employees or society.
41209 5y ago
I strongly suspect this has to do with Japan's low birth rate. But I would love a society where you only need to work three or four days a week. As they always say no one says on their deathbed I wish I spent more time at the office
eucryphia 5y ago
Same government that runs a debt to GDP ratio of 266%
- toomuchtodo 5y ago
  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/15/spain-to-launch-trial-of-four-day-working-week https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/15/spain-to-launc... (Spain to launch trial of four-day working week) 120% debt to GDP For fun, the US is at 127%. Equity, debt, fiat, just rows in a database. If it doesn’t work out, what’s the worst that happens? We go back to few more hours a week? But if it does work, it’s time work evolves further.
  - andrewmcwatters 5y ago
    Say you loan someone some money, and they just… don’t pay it back. Well, who cares right? After all, it’s just a number in your bank account.
    - toomuchtodo 5y ago
      Nation state finances are not the same as household finances.
      - andrewmcwatters 5y ago
        This meme is just foolish and overly repeated. If we just printed money forever we’d be like Germany or Venezuela. Do you really think that at large scales the need to watch spending just dissolves? Why do you think nations have budgets? Do you think it’s all a fun game? If what you’re suggesting doesn’t work, people don’t just go back to work longer hours. Some people die, some people lose their homes. Incredible. But hey, just rows in a database. Tell that to families scraping by.
        toomuchtodo 5y ago
        I think it’s reasonable to iterate and experiment with policy without devolving to extreme positions such as your comment. We’ve forgiven $3 billion in student loan debt in the US, for various legitimate reasons, without consequence for example. Yes, the US has more power to do this because it’s a reserve currency, and no you can’t do it forever, but there is room to experiment when you’re a nation state. https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2021/06/16/biden-has-now-cancelled-3-billion-of-student-loans/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2021/06/16/biden-h...
mc32 5y ago
Will they let/make people to leave the office at "5PM"? and force them to take earned holidays? Might as well do something about nomikai[1] while they are at it. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomikai https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomikai
- toomuchtodo 5y ago
  If not these are great ideas! And compliance can be measured and actioned (turn off lights automatically, lock out logins and emails on holidays).
  - derefr 5y ago
    I feel like anything the Japanese government does that only disincentivizes employees from overwork, without disincentivizing employers from expecting overwork, will only result in employees finding new and creative ways to overwork to appease their employers.
    - lkois 5y ago
      I worked in a couple of Japanese tech offices. Contracts and salary included prepaid overtime, to get around the government saying ALL overtime should be paid. But they must have also allowed up to 40 hours per month to be considered "reasonable", so that number was in the contract, and I'd only get overtime if I went over it. Felt like a shitty loophole to agree to, but luckily both companies were super cool and overtime was uncommon, but happened sometimes. So it felt like they'd just put it in as a convenience, like saying "there might be some overtime, but let's not deal with paperwork unless it gets out of hand". And the "40 hours" was paid regardless. It would definitely be a convenient loophole for companies to continue shitty practices, so I think I just lucked out with the places I worked at.
      - flippinburgers 5y ago
        At the end of the day all that matters is how much one makes for when working full-time. I find it insulting that the employer acts like it is already paying you for a 2 hour per day overtime schedule on a salary that is already bad. To be clear Japanese salaries, in my experience, are bad. Slicing out some of the already low salary and claiming it is there just in case one does work overtime is not ok.
eric4smith 5y ago
Big mistake. It was the 5-6 day week that built modern Japan. A lot of people are talking about cutting back on days everywhere. But now, more than ever, is when we need to be working harder to get back to where we were before. (Of course, my attitude to these things is shaped by being a business owner -- not an employee. So take with that point of view)
- andrewxdiamond 5y ago
  The objective of work is not "to work", its to be productive. If a 4 day week is more productive than a 5 day, why wouldn't you support it as a business owner?
  - tasogare 5y ago
    > The objective of work is not "to work", its to be productive. Exactly. Which is why of all governments the Japanese one is pushing the 4 day week is really surprising. Here the mentality is really to work for the show, even if resulting in no increase of production whatsoever.
- echelon 5y ago
  Only an owner would feel that way. Without significant equity, what's the point? The worker gets nothing except less life and more stress. The owner sucks up all the benefit.
  - burlesona 5y ago
    Perhaps society would be better off if more of us were owners?
    - echelon 5y ago
      That's what the creator economy is!
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
rawtxapp 5y ago
I think more companies should (and probably will consider) 4-day maybe even 3-day workweeks as technology makes us more productive. Especially in industries that require deep thinking, the output doesn't necessarily scale with # of hours a worker puts in, not every hour is the same. I think 10 hours of highly productive work is much better than 40 hours of busy work. Anecdotally, I managed to accumulate almost 300 hours of vacation time and now switched over to 3-day weeks at a big tech company for a while and even though I really enjoy my work, I feel much better this way and roughly at the same productivity, but a lot happier.
- ekianjo 5y ago
  > Especially in industries that require deep thinking, the output doesn't necessarily scale with # of hours a worker puts in, not every hour is the same. Its not about the number of days per week, it's also about the frequency of the thinking you put into it. If you do a 4 days break between two work days, I'd be very surprised if you remember anything in detail of your previous work period.
  - xmprt 5y ago
    Not all "weekends" have to be at the end of the week. You can have a weekend Wednesday and be able to recharge every 2 days without having to wait for 4 full days before your next weekend.
    - user123456780 5y ago
      This is the way. I did this for a few months to burn through some of my leave budget. It was great Wednesday became my chores day. Get the house in order, go to the bank whatever. Then the weekend was entirely spent on luxury and entertainment. My overall output was reasonably similar to that of a 5 day week because I came at work with a waay better attitude. It also made it easier to plan 2 days of work instead of 5. I also spent a chunk of my Wednesday thinking about work and how to tackle the next two days. That meant I could without guilt take the weekend entirely off and not even think about work at all.
paxys 5y ago
It's an open secret at least in the tech world that absolutely no one is putting in a productive 40 hours of work a week. This was true well before the pandemic and is more pronounced than ever now. Everyone needs to be "present" for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, but spends their time in pointless meetings, preparing documents and powerpoints that no one will read, faux social/teambuilding events, hour long lunches, goofing off on the internet, all to maintain the pretense of office culture. Companies that shuffle things up to prioritize productivity over simply showing up will be set to succeed over the next generation.
- bob1029 5y ago
  > absolutely no one is putting in a productive 40 hours of work a week You are being a little broad with this statement. One can easily put in 60+ hours for weeks on end and be incredibly productive while doing it. Its all circumstantial. If you have no family, are the sole founder in the company, and really enjoy what you are doing, why the fuck would you stop at a 40 hour work week? Not all of us loathe the thing we do for the majority of our waking hours.
  - impostir 5y ago
    I would just say that choosing to work more than 40 hrs per week is very different to being forced to work 40 hrs per week. Simply because someone can happily choose more work hours does not mean that the de facto standard should be that high or even at 40 hrs.
  - monsieurbanana 5y ago
    I read it more as "no one is having 40 hours per week of productive work continuously". Even in your example, being productive for 60+ hours is possible, but for how long? There might be extreme (extreme!) outliers, but I think it's fair to say that at some point you will increase your productivity by putting in less hours.
    - rogerkirkness 5y ago
      I can work 55 hours a week in perpetuity as a founder, with the exception of four off grid, week long vacations a year. Even two weeks over 60 hours (e.g. fundraising across timezones) and I rapidly lose it.
qaid 5y ago
Hopefully a move like this will help with their declining birthrate problem
- ekianjo 5y ago
  It's not overtime/overwork that causes declining birthrates in Japan.
MattGaiser 5y ago
Tangential, but how many of us need a dedicated work time period at all? I have a 15 minute standup every day, an hour long 1 on 1 once every two weeks, and the occasional meeting where I am genuinely needed and maybe 3 hours talking to another developer. I would love to convert my job into a purely objectives driven thing with the only requirement being that I am online/in the office for those specific 5 or so hours a week. I will take the risk that what I think takes a week of work runs over (forcing me to work on weekends) in exchange for that kind of flexibility.
- hypnoscripto 5y ago
  That’s basically my life and it’s fantastic. I work 12 timezones away from my colleagues. Get real work done while they are asleep, stay up for occasional meetings, scheduled in advance. I usually take two tickets at once, so if I get stuck and need help, I can switch to the other ticket until someone who can help me is awake.
  - MattGaiser 5y ago
    I admittedly did this a few weeks during the pandemic. Worked through the night, attended standup, and then slept and went about my day, answering Slack stuff in the late afternoon. So productive.
- s1artibartfast 5y ago
  On the other hand, I have 4-5 hours of meetings a day, often in scarce overlap hours between timezones. Having to take 10 different random schedules into account would be hell. Sure, people could just work flexibly to accommodate the necessary meetings, but I'm my experience, that just leads to people being on call for 10-12 hours a day with no regular schedule. In every company I have been part of, workers who didn't need dedicated work times simply didn't keep them. It is only becomes an issue if it doesn't work.
kumarvvr 5y ago
Of all places, that this is coming from Japan is astounding. The culture of "company man" in Japan is notorious for essentially absorbing and erasing the line between family life and company life for an employee. There are horror stories floating around on the internet that explain how many stay in office, often later than their boss, just to look like they are working hard. And I have experienced it first hand. Went to Mitsubishi factory in Takasago on a company visit. I asked the employees there, why do you stay late, and they answered, everyone has to stay late. I genuinely believe that an alternative to the 4-day week, is to allow employees to switch off their work emails and phone calls on Friday evening. No use in having a 4 day week, when your mind-share is extended to a 6 day week.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  > There are horror stories floating around on the internet that explain how many stay in office, often later than their boss, just to look like they are working hard. The horror story there is in how late that takes them to in many cases. A friend spent a year in Japan. Leaving by 8 was apparently a good day.
  - etempleton 5y ago
    It does seem like Japan starts their day a bit later than the US. Perhaps more similar to some businesses in New York where you might roll into the office between 10 and 11, but then stay until 8 or 9 pm. Still a very long day. It is so ingrained in their work culture that closing the office one additional day a week may be the only way to give some time back to employees.
  - SilverRed 5y ago
    I have heard that this is somewhat offset by rolling up a lot of social/etc time in to work. So they will have dinner at work with the other employees. Still horrible but it helps to understand how they even manage to live while working that long.
- erikerikson 5y ago
  There was a recent study at Microsoft Japan if I recall correctly. There have been rigorous studies throughout the works for some time before that.
EE84M3i 5y ago
I think people might be a little confused about what the government is telegraphing here. Japanese labour regulations are very strict, in particular around hours worked. Basically all employees (yes, including engineers) need to clock in and out, the concept of a "salaried worker" doesn't really exist, although normally engineers are paid for a certain number of hours regardless if they are actually worked. Primarily it is to make sure that overtime is paid and not excessive, but I believe there are also some related to the definition of what a "full time" job is. So, it sounds to me like the government is considering relaxing those definitions on minimum hours worked to make it easier for firms to adopt 4 day work week if they so choose.
- amake 5y ago
  > Basically all employees (yes, including engineers) need to clock in and out, the concept of a "salaried worker" doesn't really exist 裁量労働制 certainly meets the spirit of "salaried worker" if not the letter ("need" to clock in for at least 1 minute to be counted as working for the day).
- loosetypes 5y ago
  > the concept of a "salaried worker" doesn't really exist https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salaryman https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salaryman
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- totetsu 5y ago
  I wonder what this will mean for all those teaching contracts that come in at 30mins short of a "full time" job, for the purposes of the company not having to pay benefits..
tus89 5y ago
Maybe they should start with 8-hour days, then do a 4-day workweek XD
trixie_ 5y ago
Wouldn't it be cool if in addition to a 4 day work week, that those days could be flexible. It could actually benefit the both society and the company, as in the company is operating in some form 7 days a week for customers. And for society the 'weekend' is more flexible which improves traffic during the week and the overcrowding you typically find on saturday/sunday.
koch 5y ago
This could make it a little more difficult to keep track of companies that have a 4 day week[0], but a good problem to have I guess! [0] https://thelistofcompanies.com https://thelistofcompanies.com
brbrodude 5y ago
Would this have something to do with improving natality rates?
- ksec 5y ago
  Well surely that is the only reason why they are pushing for it. And yet most of the discussions seems to be missing the point. ( Discussing Work hours without Japanese in the context ) I am not entirely sure if this will help though. Birth Rate in Japan, ( or in any nation ) is a complex issues. Both cultural and economics. Why would anyone want a baby when they can barely afford themselves decent standard of living? ( Standard being different from person to person )
  - alephnan 5y ago
    > when they can barely afford themselves decent standard of living Rent and food even in Tokyo is much cheaper than even medium sized cities in the states. People might not be able to afford a luxurious lifestyle in Japan, and economists standard of living models may tell you otherwise, but the standard of living for a typical person in Japan is high
    - ksec 5y ago
      Which is why I said ( Standard being different from person to person ). Once it becomes a norm, people want more.
      - alephnan 5y ago
        You originally argued Japan has low birthrate because people can’t afford it. There are macro and microeconomic reasons , but not being able to afford to raise a child is not one of them. Most of the reasons are social.
deevolution 5y ago
"Those who want more days off for such purposes as acquiring new skills and taking side jobs are not eligible for the program, he said." Of course - why would a company want their employees to learn new skills on the side that could potentially lead to greater personal fulfillment -.-
supernova87a 5y ago
How about they first do away with the culture of "have to show your face in the office until 7pm and then go drinking with your colleagues until midnight, or your wife will ask why you're home so early"?
- philosopher1234 5y ago
  My impression is that the men are abandoning their wives to manage the ids, their own careers, and housework, not pressuring the men to stay away.
- youeseh 5y ago
  How would the government of Japan do away with this? If it was more important than backing the 4 day work week, why don't you think it happened first?
  - supernova87a 5y ago
    It was kind of a snarky joke/commentary, I guess it was hard to convey the sentiment over text.
mjcohen 5y ago
Amazon supports the 8-day workweek for its warehouse workers.
skhr0680 5y ago
The social contract in Japan was that you’d give your life to your employer in exchange for a fair wage and stable employment until you retired. Neither of those things are true now. Wages are low and companies either ignore their legal obligations or hire people as contractors, who have less rights than full time “employees”. Now, many people, especially women* and young people are finding that it’s possible to run a small business for 3-4 days a week and make more money than an entry or even mid-level full time office job. So, I think Japan finally enforcing rules against abusive behavior at the workplace and pushing for a 4-day week, if it really happens, is a reflection of where society is at right now. *Women have a low wage ceiling because they are expected to quit and have children at any time.
- nkssy 5y ago
  I think it says a lot about Japanese workplace pay if a small business at 3-4 days per week can outperform it. Not that I doubt it in any way: I've just started my own sideline and I'm already at 25% of my job income yet only putting in 5 hours of effort to do so.
  - TrackerFF 5y ago
    Yes, but for how long though. Many of these Japanese firms are many hundreds of years old, and will probably stick around for some hundred more years. Being able to run a small business for 5-10 years is very possible, but there's no guarantee you'll be able to do that for 20-30-40 years. We often hear about the success stories, when it comes to small businesses and startups, but there are unfortunately those that will fail after N years, even if they had some pretty good years.
    - draw_down 5y ago
      It doesn’t have to be the same small business across all those years, right? I don’t think anyone is saying these small businesses are trying to become hundred-year firms.
- suls 5y ago
Aeolun 5y ago
My guess is they’ll ask employees to work 4 10 hour days, and ask them to come in for extra work on Friday and Saturday as a ‘special exception’. Of course, now the 10 hour workday is normalized, so you can extract extra time on the other days too.
onion2k 5y ago
I think a lot of the replies in the thread so far have focused on tech (understandably, this is HN after all) but that's missing something obvious - the 4 day week would apply to everyone. In tech it's very likely someone going from 5 days to 4 days could still achieve the same amount of actual work. As other commenters have said, many tech workers don't do productive work all the time they're present. Retail workers, factory workers, people who fill in the holes in roads, telephone support people, etc aren't contending with pointless meetings and busy work though. They can't do 40 hours of work in 32 hours by removing some of the hours they're not really working. What they do doesn't compress like that. Consequently looking at this from the context of tech workers is far less interesting. The Japanese government isn't saying "Let's get rid of pointless meetings and busy work!" In tech removing the pointless nonsense isn't actually reducing the amount of real work people do. Instead, Japan is saying "Our country is wealthy enough and advanced enough that our people can actually do less work." That's fascinating. If you see this as "removing the wasteful time spent on things that aren't useful like meetinga" then you've missed the point. It is that, but it's much, much more than that too.
- legulere 5y ago
  People are still going to work more efficient when they work 32 instead of 40 hours in many jobs as fatigue sets in at some point.
  - kortilla 5y ago
    No, there are jobs where you do rote things on demand or at particular intervals with no fatigue at 40 hours per week. Examples from my own employment experience: - front desk clerk at a hotel - fuel pump operator Both of these are pretty dull work that doesn’t exhaust you at all at the 40 hour work week. Most of the time is spent idle and the time spent working doesn’t require much going on upstairs.
    - fy20 5y ago
      Most of these customer facing jobs will be abandoned or optimised away in the next few decades. Front desk work could be done away with mostly by electronic systems (most of the time when I "check in" it's just picking up a ready made room card as I checked in online). You could even centralise the "talking to a human" part in a call center operating a number of hotels, who delegate to staff on the premises (house keeping, maintenance, room service, etc). Of course luxury hotels will still have humans. Fuel pump operator hasn't been a job in most Western countries for decades, as you just pump fuel yourself (and often even pay at the pump). Is "EV charger operator" a job?
misterremote 5y ago
> For employers, while people working four days a week may become more motivated, this may not improve their productivity enough to compensate for the lost workday. But why do we have to "compensate for the lost workday"? Let's just say that at this point in history we appreciate work-life balance more than before and we'll switch to 4-day weeks with the same paycheck.
misterremote 5y ago
> Takuya Hoshino, an economist at the Dai-ichi Life Research Institute, says simply introducing a four-day workweek may not necessarily encourage employees to use their time off in a way that benefits their careers or contributes to the economy. The idea shouldn't be how this benefits their career and contributes to the economy, but how the individual can live a more balanced and healthy life.
polm23 5y ago
I'm skeptical this will actually see wide adoption. I don't mean to suggest this is a universal trend, but I remember being surprised to see that Tora no Ana, a comic book shop with tech company aspirations, advertised "super engineer" positions that let you work four days a week. But it turned out this was a position with higher qualifications than a normal engineer that just gave you the option of working four ten hour days instead of five eight hour ones. https://www.toranoana.jp/recruit/super-engineer/ https://www.toranoana.jp/recruit/super-engineer/ While the suggested four day work week here sounds like a real four days and not longer hours, I do think that managing company expectations will be difficult.
ineedasername 5y ago
While I would like it, unfortunately it wouldn't work for things like customer-facing positions. If the business is open from 9am to 9pm then it still needs the same level of staff coverage. The company could either reduce pay proportionately, or keep paying the same salaries (and increase hourly workers' pay proportionately) and hire more people, incurring a 20% increase in labor costs.
perfunctory 5y ago
I have been working 4 days a week or less for about a decade by now. It's been the single best improvement to my quality of life. I've got to spend more time with my family, hobby projects, learning new things and simply chilling out. I will never ever ever ever work 5 days again.
mmmBacon 5y ago
Shouldn’t the benefit of all our technology be the gaining of time for leisure and non-work pursuits?
crossroadsguy 5y ago
I read hopeful and idealistic (I’ve the same wish and hope, by the way) comments on HN and contrast it by thinking of CEOs and CTOs not even giving this news another second; laughing at it would mean it affected them in unimaginable ways. Most of these “leaders”, especially in “startups”, have very short term goals - exit, acquisition, insane funding and valuations etc. It’s not that they don’t think about employees burning out or lack of their well-being. They count on it. They know exactly what’s happening and they know that that 2<x> year old burning out (literally falling ill mentally and physically) after 7 month of hell, but wrote y number of functioning APIs, was a great success! And that’s just software.
Cthulhu_ 5y ago
Do they get paid the same though? I mean where I live, as an employee you have the RIGHT to work part-time if you want to - 40 hours is the norm, 36 is common (either one day off every two weeks or some manage to work 10h 4 days/week), some work 32 hours. But they get paid, vacation time, bonuses etc accordingly. I went to 36 hours when I started my new job, but went back to 40 this year because I can manage with working from home, and because of the pandemic there were no pay raises last year - while cost of living is spiraling upwards because of rapidly increasing housing prices.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
dzaragozar 5y ago
It is important to note that this announcement means that employers can opt to work for 4 days a week, with the corresponding reduction in salary. It is not reducing work week to 32h with the same salary! A similar scheme exists in the Netherlands, you are allowed to work 4 days a week AND you get paid for 4 days of work, so 80% salary.
raister 5y ago
Uruguay they tried that: people ended up working two jobs and feeling/looking tired on both! People will find a way, always. Just keep 40h - at least they won't try to find a 2nd job elsewhere...
- ThatMedicIsASpy 5y ago
  I think we eventually have to move to a 4 day work week because of employment. Switching to a 4 day work week creates jobs. The work will not be less when you switch to 4 days and to compensate you have to hire more people. Even in Europe we have countries with a high rate of unemployment among young people.
jdshaffer 5y ago
And yet most kids here (Japan) go to school nearly every day -- some classes on alternating Saturdays and have mandatory "club activities" nearly EVERY day including Saturdays and Sundays. Seems a bit of a mixed message going on...
- kwere 5y ago
  japanese collectivism
diminish 5y ago
I wonder if it would boost productivity - to move to a 5-day week, instead of 7 by - abolishing saturday and sunday - We can have 3 days of work - thursday & friday as weekend
88840-8855 5y ago
I worked in Japan for a while. My contract was saying 28.5 hours per week, but I was expected to work 40 hours+. This is where I went into discussions with my boss who was very angry at me and fired me on the same say I told him that I was expecting to work the hours that were mentioned in the contract. I had to clean up the desk and leave immediatly after that meeting. Then I got in touch with the officials and lawyers. Labor law IS already strong in Japan, but it is the employees who do not demand it and the employers who do not follow it. The officials are running many campaigns to advertise equality and proper working hours. Just nobody cares. Long story short - I got my salary paid ouf for a couple of months and could stay in Japan. Best time of my life and this is the way you should experience Japan: live there, DO NOT work, have enough money to support a certain lifestyle. Now I am back to Germany and I am happy that I have a decently paid, low stress 40 hours work week, 100% home office, many perks, I am practially unfireable, 32 holidays per year and a worker friendly corporate culture.
dsq 5y ago
The main driver for this may be Japan's demographic implosion, as stated in the first paragraph: "...improve the balance between work and life...family care". A three day weekend would give the salaryman/person some time with family. Other countries are making policy changes as well. China is also planning to remove all caps on births to combat what they see as problematic demographics.
meerita 5y ago
Correct me, but they want to cheapen the labor by adding more people do to the same job on a week timeline?
Proven 5y ago
If any of the so called "experts" who support this had any clue, they could have been leading most successful Japan companies. But they aren't. Because they are merely just academics with socialist leanings.
skinpop 5y ago
here in japan where I live 5 day work weeks are unheard of. everyone is working monday to saturday.
- fomine3 5y ago
  It depends.
Iv 5y ago
Start by giving them holidays. Even US companies give more holidays to their employees.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
LdSGSgvupDV 5y ago
I kept wondering that when we are child it's almost impossible to study 8 hours a day all the time. Why should/could we work 8 hours as adult?
xs83 5y ago
4 Days but 18 hours work each day to "Keep productivity" Obviously being facetious but the Japanese work ethic expectations are terrifying
tothecore13423 5y ago
This is a genius move. The problem with japan's work culture is that its very hard to change the longer work hours. The alternative is to reduce the number of working days. This becomes level playing field for everyone and so there is good chance this will work, if it becomes law.

881 points by m3at 5y ago

Will this be one of those Japanese quirks just like 5pm, where they say 4 day work week, but then still work 5-6 work weeks? Like sure, you can leave at 5, but do you want to be the person to leave at 5?

ekianjo 5y ago

Why does the government need to be involved if employers actually get better productivity in the first place? Let employers experiment by themselves and see what works best. Another typical example of top-to-bottom leadership in Japan.

culopatin 5y ago
Perhaps because without the intervention, they weren’t doing it.
- ekianjo 5y ago
  Then you probably need to ask why.
kumarvvr 5y ago
If the government doesn't make laws that define broad principles, capitalism will eat you alive. Employers are greedy and evil. Their focus is profit maximization. Not employee well being. Given the chance, do you really think employers will even give vacation days to employees? No way. They will want you to work 24/7 if the govt. is ok with it.
- throw123123123 5y ago
  Where do you think the salary comes from in the beginning?
  - kumarvvr 5y ago
    At the beginning of civilized society? From the government itself. Then it slowly evolves into capital flow to people closely connected to the government (aristocrats, royalty, etc) and then to common people through banks. You seem to imply that for any entrepreneurship, you need to have no worker protections at all. But that is simply false.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - ekianjo 5y ago
      > At the beginning of civilized society? From the government itself. You seem to have no understanding that powerful states is a VERY recent invention in History.
    - throw123123123 5y ago
      > From the government itself There is no government possible without incomes that support it. You got this exactly the other way around.
- ekianjo 5y ago
  > If the government doesn't make laws that define broad principles, capitalism will eat you alive. Has it? Levels of life of the whole world are on the rise for the past 20 years at least - if you want to make that argument the current data does not support that at all.
  - boardwaalk 5y ago
    Look up the industrial revolution and labor laws. Y'know, when things like child labor were outlawed. Good things, I hope you will agree.
- kwere 5y ago
  ford & Westinghouse disagree with you, but that is possible only in non-feudalistic sectors and benevolent masters
rvba 5y ago
Then you end up with 996 system that is good for employers but not for employees or society.

41209 5y ago

I strongly suspect this has to do with Japan's low birth rate. But I would love a society where you only need to work three or four days a week. As they always say no one says on their deathbed I wish I spent more time at the office

eucryphia 5y ago

Same government that runs a debt to GDP ratio of 266%

toomuchtodo 5y ago
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/15/spain-to-launch-trial-of-four-day-working-week https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/15/spain-to-launc... (Spain to launch trial of four-day working week) 120% debt to GDP For fun, the US is at 127%. Equity, debt, fiat, just rows in a database. If it doesn’t work out, what’s the worst that happens? We go back to few more hours a week? But if it does work, it’s time work evolves further.
- andrewmcwatters 5y ago
  Say you loan someone some money, and they just… don’t pay it back. Well, who cares right? After all, it’s just a number in your bank account.
  - toomuchtodo 5y ago
    Nation state finances are not the same as household finances.
    - andrewmcwatters 5y ago
      This meme is just foolish and overly repeated. If we just printed money forever we’d be like Germany or Venezuela. Do you really think that at large scales the need to watch spending just dissolves? Why do you think nations have budgets? Do you think it’s all a fun game? If what you’re suggesting doesn’t work, people don’t just go back to work longer hours. Some people die, some people lose their homes. Incredible. But hey, just rows in a database. Tell that to families scraping by.
      - toomuchtodo 5y ago
        I think it’s reasonable to iterate and experiment with policy without devolving to extreme positions such as your comment. We’ve forgiven $3 billion in student loan debt in the US, for various legitimate reasons, without consequence for example. Yes, the US has more power to do this because it’s a reserve currency, and no you can’t do it forever, but there is room to experiment when you’re a nation state. https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2021/06/16/biden-has-now-cancelled-3-billion-of-student-loans/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2021/06/16/biden-h...

mc32 5y ago

Will they let/make people to leave the office at "5PM"? and force them to take earned holidays? Might as well do something about nomikai[1] while they are at it. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomikai https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomikai

toomuchtodo 5y ago
If not these are great ideas! And compliance can be measured and actioned (turn off lights automatically, lock out logins and emails on holidays).
- derefr 5y ago
  I feel like anything the Japanese government does that only disincentivizes employees from overwork, without disincentivizing employers from expecting overwork, will only result in employees finding new and creative ways to overwork to appease their employers.
  - lkois 5y ago
    I worked in a couple of Japanese tech offices. Contracts and salary included prepaid overtime, to get around the government saying ALL overtime should be paid. But they must have also allowed up to 40 hours per month to be considered "reasonable", so that number was in the contract, and I'd only get overtime if I went over it. Felt like a shitty loophole to agree to, but luckily both companies were super cool and overtime was uncommon, but happened sometimes. So it felt like they'd just put it in as a convenience, like saying "there might be some overtime, but let's not deal with paperwork unless it gets out of hand". And the "40 hours" was paid regardless. It would definitely be a convenient loophole for companies to continue shitty practices, so I think I just lucked out with the places I worked at.
    - flippinburgers 5y ago
      At the end of the day all that matters is how much one makes for when working full-time. I find it insulting that the employer acts like it is already paying you for a 2 hour per day overtime schedule on a salary that is already bad. To be clear Japanese salaries, in my experience, are bad. Slicing out some of the already low salary and claiming it is there just in case one does work overtime is not ok.

eric4smith 5y ago

Big mistake. It was the 5-6 day week that built modern Japan. A lot of people are talking about cutting back on days everywhere. But now, more than ever, is when we need to be working harder to get back to where we were before. (Of course, my attitude to these things is shaped by being a business owner -- not an employee. So take with that point of view)

andrewxdiamond 5y ago
The objective of work is not "to work", its to be productive. If a 4 day week is more productive than a 5 day, why wouldn't you support it as a business owner?
- tasogare 5y ago
  > The objective of work is not "to work", its to be productive. Exactly. Which is why of all governments the Japanese one is pushing the 4 day week is really surprising. Here the mentality is really to work for the show, even if resulting in no increase of production whatsoever.
echelon 5y ago
Only an owner would feel that way. Without significant equity, what's the point? The worker gets nothing except less life and more stress. The owner sucks up all the benefit.
- burlesona 5y ago
  Perhaps society would be better off if more of us were owners?
  - echelon 5y ago
    That's what the creator economy is!
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]

rawtxapp 5y ago

I think more companies should (and probably will consider) 4-day maybe even 3-day workweeks as technology makes us more productive. Especially in industries that require deep thinking, the output doesn't necessarily scale with # of hours a worker puts in, not every hour is the same. I think 10 hours of highly productive work is much better than 40 hours of busy work. Anecdotally, I managed to accumulate almost 300 hours of vacation time and now switched over to 3-day weeks at a big tech company for a while and even though I really enjoy my work, I feel much better this way and roughly at the same productivity, but a lot happier.

ekianjo 5y ago
> Especially in industries that require deep thinking, the output doesn't necessarily scale with # of hours a worker puts in, not every hour is the same. Its not about the number of days per week, it's also about the frequency of the thinking you put into it. If you do a 4 days break between two work days, I'd be very surprised if you remember anything in detail of your previous work period.
- xmprt 5y ago
  Not all "weekends" have to be at the end of the week. You can have a weekend Wednesday and be able to recharge every 2 days without having to wait for 4 full days before your next weekend.
  - user123456780 5y ago
    This is the way. I did this for a few months to burn through some of my leave budget. It was great Wednesday became my chores day. Get the house in order, go to the bank whatever. Then the weekend was entirely spent on luxury and entertainment. My overall output was reasonably similar to that of a 5 day week because I came at work with a waay better attitude. It also made it easier to plan 2 days of work instead of 5. I also spent a chunk of my Wednesday thinking about work and how to tackle the next two days. That meant I could without guilt take the weekend entirely off and not even think about work at all.

paxys 5y ago

It's an open secret at least in the tech world that absolutely no one is putting in a productive 40 hours of work a week. This was true well before the pandemic and is more pronounced than ever now. Everyone needs to be "present" for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, but spends their time in pointless meetings, preparing documents and powerpoints that no one will read, faux social/teambuilding events, hour long lunches, goofing off on the internet, all to maintain the pretense of office culture. Companies that shuffle things up to prioritize productivity over simply showing up will be set to succeed over the next generation.

bob1029 5y ago
> absolutely no one is putting in a productive 40 hours of work a week You are being a little broad with this statement. One can easily put in 60+ hours for weeks on end and be incredibly productive while doing it. Its all circumstantial. If you have no family, are the sole founder in the company, and really enjoy what you are doing, why the fuck would you stop at a 40 hour work week? Not all of us loathe the thing we do for the majority of our waking hours.
- impostir 5y ago
  I would just say that choosing to work more than 40 hrs per week is very different to being forced to work 40 hrs per week. Simply because someone can happily choose more work hours does not mean that the de facto standard should be that high or even at 40 hrs.
- monsieurbanana 5y ago
  I read it more as "no one is having 40 hours per week of productive work continuously". Even in your example, being productive for 60+ hours is possible, but for how long? There might be extreme (extreme!) outliers, but I think it's fair to say that at some point you will increase your productivity by putting in less hours.
  - rogerkirkness 5y ago
    I can work 55 hours a week in perpetuity as a founder, with the exception of four off grid, week long vacations a year. Even two weeks over 60 hours (e.g. fundraising across timezones) and I rapidly lose it.

qaid 5y ago

Hopefully a move like this will help with their declining birthrate problem

ekianjo 5y ago
It's not overtime/overwork that causes declining birthrates in Japan.

MattGaiser 5y ago

Tangential, but how many of us need a dedicated work time period at all? I have a 15 minute standup every day, an hour long 1 on 1 once every two weeks, and the occasional meeting where I am genuinely needed and maybe 3 hours talking to another developer. I would love to convert my job into a purely objectives driven thing with the only requirement being that I am online/in the office for those specific 5 or so hours a week. I will take the risk that what I think takes a week of work runs over (forcing me to work on weekends) in exchange for that kind of flexibility.

hypnoscripto 5y ago
That’s basically my life and it’s fantastic. I work 12 timezones away from my colleagues. Get real work done while they are asleep, stay up for occasional meetings, scheduled in advance. I usually take two tickets at once, so if I get stuck and need help, I can switch to the other ticket until someone who can help me is awake.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  I admittedly did this a few weeks during the pandemic. Worked through the night, attended standup, and then slept and went about my day, answering Slack stuff in the late afternoon. So productive.
s1artibartfast 5y ago
On the other hand, I have 4-5 hours of meetings a day, often in scarce overlap hours between timezones. Having to take 10 different random schedules into account would be hell. Sure, people could just work flexibly to accommodate the necessary meetings, but I'm my experience, that just leads to people being on call for 10-12 hours a day with no regular schedule. In every company I have been part of, workers who didn't need dedicated work times simply didn't keep them. It is only becomes an issue if it doesn't work.

kumarvvr 5y ago

Of all places, that this is coming from Japan is astounding. The culture of "company man" in Japan is notorious for essentially absorbing and erasing the line between family life and company life for an employee. There are horror stories floating around on the internet that explain how many stay in office, often later than their boss, just to look like they are working hard. And I have experienced it first hand. Went to Mitsubishi factory in Takasago on a company visit. I asked the employees there, why do you stay late, and they answered, everyone has to stay late. I genuinely believe that an alternative to the 4-day week, is to allow employees to switch off their work emails and phone calls on Friday evening. No use in having a 4 day week, when your mind-share is extended to a 6 day week.

MattGaiser 5y ago
> There are horror stories floating around on the internet that explain how many stay in office, often later than their boss, just to look like they are working hard. The horror story there is in how late that takes them to in many cases. A friend spent a year in Japan. Leaving by 8 was apparently a good day.
- etempleton 5y ago
  It does seem like Japan starts their day a bit later than the US. Perhaps more similar to some businesses in New York where you might roll into the office between 10 and 11, but then stay until 8 or 9 pm. Still a very long day. It is so ingrained in their work culture that closing the office one additional day a week may be the only way to give some time back to employees.
- SilverRed 5y ago
  I have heard that this is somewhat offset by rolling up a lot of social/etc time in to work. So they will have dinner at work with the other employees. Still horrible but it helps to understand how they even manage to live while working that long.
erikerikson 5y ago
There was a recent study at Microsoft Japan if I recall correctly. There have been rigorous studies throughout the works for some time before that.

EE84M3i 5y ago

I think people might be a little confused about what the government is telegraphing here. Japanese labour regulations are very strict, in particular around hours worked. Basically all employees (yes, including engineers) need to clock in and out, the concept of a "salaried worker" doesn't really exist, although normally engineers are paid for a certain number of hours regardless if they are actually worked. Primarily it is to make sure that overtime is paid and not excessive, but I believe there are also some related to the definition of what a "full time" job is. So, it sounds to me like the government is considering relaxing those definitions on minimum hours worked to make it easier for firms to adopt 4 day work week if they so choose.

amake 5y ago
> Basically all employees (yes, including engineers) need to clock in and out, the concept of a "salaried worker" doesn't really exist 裁量労働制 certainly meets the spirit of "salaried worker" if not the letter ("need" to clock in for at least 1 minute to be counted as working for the day).
loosetypes 5y ago
> the concept of a "salaried worker" doesn't really exist https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salaryman https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salaryman
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
totetsu 5y ago
I wonder what this will mean for all those teaching contracts that come in at 30mins short of a "full time" job, for the purposes of the company not having to pay benefits..

tus89 5y ago

Maybe they should start with 8-hour days, then do a 4-day workweek XD

trixie_ 5y ago

Wouldn't it be cool if in addition to a 4 day work week, that those days could be flexible. It could actually benefit the both society and the company, as in the company is operating in some form 7 days a week for customers. And for society the 'weekend' is more flexible which improves traffic during the week and the overcrowding you typically find on saturday/sunday.

koch 5y ago

This could make it a little more difficult to keep track of companies that have a 4 day week[0], but a good problem to have I guess! [0] https://thelistofcompanies.com https://thelistofcompanies.com

brbrodude 5y ago

Would this have something to do with improving natality rates?

ksec 5y ago
Well surely that is the only reason why they are pushing for it. And yet most of the discussions seems to be missing the point. ( Discussing Work hours without Japanese in the context ) I am not entirely sure if this will help though. Birth Rate in Japan, ( or in any nation ) is a complex issues. Both cultural and economics. Why would anyone want a baby when they can barely afford themselves decent standard of living? ( Standard being different from person to person )
- alephnan 5y ago
  > when they can barely afford themselves decent standard of living Rent and food even in Tokyo is much cheaper than even medium sized cities in the states. People might not be able to afford a luxurious lifestyle in Japan, and economists standard of living models may tell you otherwise, but the standard of living for a typical person in Japan is high
  - ksec 5y ago
    Which is why I said ( Standard being different from person to person ). Once it becomes a norm, people want more.
    - alephnan 5y ago
      You originally argued Japan has low birthrate because people can’t afford it. There are macro and microeconomic reasons , but not being able to afford to raise a child is not one of them. Most of the reasons are social.

deevolution 5y ago

"Those who want more days off for such purposes as acquiring new skills and taking side jobs are not eligible for the program, he said." Of course - why would a company want their employees to learn new skills on the side that could potentially lead to greater personal fulfillment -.-

supernova87a 5y ago

How about they first do away with the culture of "have to show your face in the office until 7pm and then go drinking with your colleagues until midnight, or your wife will ask why you're home so early"?

philosopher1234 5y ago
My impression is that the men are abandoning their wives to manage the ids, their own careers, and housework, not pressuring the men to stay away.
youeseh 5y ago
How would the government of Japan do away with this? If it was more important than backing the 4 day work week, why don't you think it happened first?
- supernova87a 5y ago
  It was kind of a snarky joke/commentary, I guess it was hard to convey the sentiment over text.

mjcohen 5y ago

Amazon supports the 8-day workweek for its warehouse workers.

skhr0680 5y ago

The social contract in Japan was that you’d give your life to your employer in exchange for a fair wage and stable employment until you retired. Neither of those things are true now. Wages are low and companies either ignore their legal obligations or hire people as contractors, who have less rights than full time “employees”. Now, many people, especially women* and young people are finding that it’s possible to run a small business for 3-4 days a week and make more money than an entry or even mid-level full time office job. So, I think Japan finally enforcing rules against abusive behavior at the workplace and pushing for a 4-day week, if it really happens, is a reflection of where society is at right now. *Women have a low wage ceiling because they are expected to quit and have children at any time.

nkssy 5y ago
I think it says a lot about Japanese workplace pay if a small business at 3-4 days per week can outperform it. Not that I doubt it in any way: I've just started my own sideline and I'm already at 25% of my job income yet only putting in 5 hours of effort to do so.
- TrackerFF 5y ago
  Yes, but for how long though. Many of these Japanese firms are many hundreds of years old, and will probably stick around for some hundred more years. Being able to run a small business for 5-10 years is very possible, but there's no guarantee you'll be able to do that for 20-30-40 years. We often hear about the success stories, when it comes to small businesses and startups, but there are unfortunately those that will fail after N years, even if they had some pretty good years.
  - draw_down 5y ago
    It doesn’t have to be the same small business across all those years, right? I don’t think anyone is saying these small businesses are trying to become hundred-year firms.
suls 5y ago

Aeolun 5y ago

My guess is they’ll ask employees to work 4 10 hour days, and ask them to come in for extra work on Friday and Saturday as a ‘special exception’. Of course, now the 10 hour workday is normalized, so you can extract extra time on the other days too.

onion2k 5y ago

I think a lot of the replies in the thread so far have focused on tech (understandably, this is HN after all) but that's missing something obvious - the 4 day week would apply to everyone. In tech it's very likely someone going from 5 days to 4 days could still achieve the same amount of actual work. As other commenters have said, many tech workers don't do productive work all the time they're present. Retail workers, factory workers, people who fill in the holes in roads, telephone support people, etc aren't contending with pointless meetings and busy work though. They can't do 40 hours of work in 32 hours by removing some of the hours they're not really working. What they do doesn't compress like that. Consequently looking at this from the context of tech workers is far less interesting. The Japanese government isn't saying "Let's get rid of pointless meetings and busy work!" In tech removing the pointless nonsense isn't actually reducing the amount of real work people do. Instead, Japan is saying "Our country is wealthy enough and advanced enough that our people can actually do less work." That's fascinating. If you see this as "removing the wasteful time spent on things that aren't useful like meetinga" then you've missed the point. It is that, but it's much, much more than that too.

legulere 5y ago
People are still going to work more efficient when they work 32 instead of 40 hours in many jobs as fatigue sets in at some point.
- kortilla 5y ago
  No, there are jobs where you do rote things on demand or at particular intervals with no fatigue at 40 hours per week. Examples from my own employment experience: - front desk clerk at a hotel - fuel pump operator Both of these are pretty dull work that doesn’t exhaust you at all at the 40 hour work week. Most of the time is spent idle and the time spent working doesn’t require much going on upstairs.
  - fy20 5y ago
    Most of these customer facing jobs will be abandoned or optimised away in the next few decades. Front desk work could be done away with mostly by electronic systems (most of the time when I "check in" it's just picking up a ready made room card as I checked in online). You could even centralise the "talking to a human" part in a call center operating a number of hotels, who delegate to staff on the premises (house keeping, maintenance, room service, etc). Of course luxury hotels will still have humans. Fuel pump operator hasn't been a job in most Western countries for decades, as you just pump fuel yourself (and often even pay at the pump). Is "EV charger operator" a job?

misterremote 5y ago

> For employers, while people working four days a week may become more motivated, this may not improve their productivity enough to compensate for the lost workday. But why do we have to "compensate for the lost workday"? Let's just say that at this point in history we appreciate work-life balance more than before and we'll switch to 4-day weeks with the same paycheck.

misterremote 5y ago

> Takuya Hoshino, an economist at the Dai-ichi Life Research Institute, says simply introducing a four-day workweek may not necessarily encourage employees to use their time off in a way that benefits their careers or contributes to the economy. The idea shouldn't be how this benefits their career and contributes to the economy, but how the individual can live a more balanced and healthy life.

polm23 5y ago

I'm skeptical this will actually see wide adoption. I don't mean to suggest this is a universal trend, but I remember being surprised to see that Tora no Ana, a comic book shop with tech company aspirations, advertised "super engineer" positions that let you work four days a week. But it turned out this was a position with higher qualifications than a normal engineer that just gave you the option of working four ten hour days instead of five eight hour ones. https://www.toranoana.jp/recruit/super-engineer/ https://www.toranoana.jp/recruit/super-engineer/ While the suggested four day work week here sounds like a real four days and not longer hours, I do think that managing company expectations will be difficult.

ineedasername 5y ago

While I would like it, unfortunately it wouldn't work for things like customer-facing positions. If the business is open from 9am to 9pm then it still needs the same level of staff coverage. The company could either reduce pay proportionately, or keep paying the same salaries (and increase hourly workers' pay proportionately) and hire more people, incurring a 20% increase in labor costs.

perfunctory 5y ago

I have been working 4 days a week or less for about a decade by now. It's been the single best improvement to my quality of life. I've got to spend more time with my family, hobby projects, learning new things and simply chilling out. I will never ever ever ever work 5 days again.

mmmBacon 5y ago

Shouldn’t the benefit of all our technology be the gaining of time for leisure and non-work pursuits?

crossroadsguy 5y ago

I read hopeful and idealistic (I’ve the same wish and hope, by the way) comments on HN and contrast it by thinking of CEOs and CTOs not even giving this news another second; laughing at it would mean it affected them in unimaginable ways. Most of these “leaders”, especially in “startups”, have very short term goals - exit, acquisition, insane funding and valuations etc. It’s not that they don’t think about employees burning out or lack of their well-being. They count on it. They know exactly what’s happening and they know that that 2<x> year old burning out (literally falling ill mentally and physically) after 7 month of hell, but wrote y number of functioning APIs, was a great success! And that’s just software.

Cthulhu_ 5y ago

Do they get paid the same though? I mean where I live, as an employee you have the RIGHT to work part-time if you want to - 40 hours is the norm, 36 is common (either one day off every two weeks or some manage to work 10h 4 days/week), some work 32 hours. But they get paid, vacation time, bonuses etc accordingly. I went to 36 hours when I started my new job, but went back to 40 this year because I can manage with working from home, and because of the pandemic there were no pay raises last year - while cost of living is spiraling upwards because of rapidly increasing housing prices.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

dzaragozar 5y ago

It is important to note that this announcement means that employers can opt to work for 4 days a week, with the corresponding reduction in salary. It is not reducing work week to 32h with the same salary! A similar scheme exists in the Netherlands, you are allowed to work 4 days a week AND you get paid for 4 days of work, so 80% salary.

raister 5y ago

Uruguay they tried that: people ended up working two jobs and feeling/looking tired on both! People will find a way, always. Just keep 40h - at least they won't try to find a 2nd job elsewhere...

ThatMedicIsASpy 5y ago
I think we eventually have to move to a 4 day work week because of employment. Switching to a 4 day work week creates jobs. The work will not be less when you switch to 4 days and to compensate you have to hire more people. Even in Europe we have countries with a high rate of unemployment among young people.

jdshaffer 5y ago

And yet most kids here (Japan) go to school nearly every day -- some classes on alternating Saturdays and have mandatory "club activities" nearly EVERY day including Saturdays and Sundays. Seems a bit of a mixed message going on...

kwere 5y ago
japanese collectivism

diminish 5y ago

I wonder if it would boost productivity - to move to a 5-day week, instead of 7 by - abolishing saturday and sunday - We can have 3 days of work - thursday & friday as weekend

88840-8855 5y ago

I worked in Japan for a while. My contract was saying 28.5 hours per week, but I was expected to work 40 hours+. This is where I went into discussions with my boss who was very angry at me and fired me on the same say I told him that I was expecting to work the hours that were mentioned in the contract. I had to clean up the desk and leave immediatly after that meeting. Then I got in touch with the officials and lawyers. Labor law IS already strong in Japan, but it is the employees who do not demand it and the employers who do not follow it. The officials are running many campaigns to advertise equality and proper working hours. Just nobody cares. Long story short - I got my salary paid ouf for a couple of months and could stay in Japan. Best time of my life and this is the way you should experience Japan: live there, DO NOT work, have enough money to support a certain lifestyle. Now I am back to Germany and I am happy that I have a decently paid, low stress 40 hours work week, 100% home office, many perks, I am practially unfireable, 32 holidays per year and a worker friendly corporate culture.

dsq 5y ago

The main driver for this may be Japan's demographic implosion, as stated in the first paragraph: "...improve the balance between work and life...family care". A three day weekend would give the salaryman/person some time with family. Other countries are making policy changes as well. China is also planning to remove all caps on births to combat what they see as problematic demographics.

meerita 5y ago

Correct me, but they want to cheapen the labor by adding more people do to the same job on a week timeline?

Proven 5y ago

If any of the so called "experts" who support this had any clue, they could have been leading most successful Japan companies. But they aren't. Because they are merely just academics with socialist leanings.

skinpop 5y ago

here in japan where I live 5 day work weeks are unheard of. everyone is working monday to saturday.

fomine3 5y ago
It depends.

Iv 5y ago

Start by giving them holidays. Even US companies give more holidays to their employees.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

LdSGSgvupDV 5y ago

I kept wondering that when we are child it's almost impossible to study 8 hours a day all the time. Why should/could we work 8 hours as adult?

xs83 5y ago

4 Days but 18 hours work each day to "Keep productivity" Obviously being facetious but the Japanese work ethic expectations are terrifying

tothecore13423 5y ago

This is a genius move. The problem with japan's work culture is that its very hard to change the longer work hours. The alternative is to reduce the number of working days. This becomes level playing field for everyone and so there is good chance this will work, if it becomes law.