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What's going to happen if the law allowed up to 20hr work weeks? Employers would pay twice less at first, but they would have to hire twice more staff, thus cre
by akomtu 4y ago
What's going to happen if the law allowed up to 20hr work weeks? Employers would pay twice less at first, but they would have to hire twice more staff, thus creating more competition for labor and driving wages up.
- esafak 4y agoThey wouldn't necessarily have to hire double because they would be able to tap into a different pool of workers: experienced and wealthier people who can afford to work less. This pool is going to grow, as the world becomes wealthier. Gradual normalization of reduced hours is how we get to eliminating work. The goal should be to give everybody the freedom to work as much or as little as they want.
- PragmaticPulp 4y agoKnowledge worker companies would invest more in countries that didn’t have such laws, then hire remotely. Manufacturing companies would move even more operations to countries without those laws. Labor that couldn’t move would become more expensive. Unfortunately this means a lot of things that consumers use directly: Plumbers, transportation, grocery store work. Things would be expensive. Also, don’t underestimate the issues that come from frequent shift changes. Imagine if you hired a plumber and they had to drop their tools and leave the job site ASAP because they just hit 20 hours for the week, but another plumber would stop by later and try to pick up where they left off.