A New Era of Work: The 32-Hour Work Week and Its Impact on Business

Recently, our team met to discuss the ongoing United Auto Workers' (UAW) strike, specifically the proposed 32-hour work week. Other unionized workforces—like Starbucks and Hollywood screen writers—have proposed similar boundaries around weekly working hours. 

In spirit, the abridged work week is meant to combat those in commonly overworked industries, where employees may work 80 or more hours in a single week—without reaping the financial benefits. These union proposals bring to light a more modern focus on work/life balance and the culture of overworking, topics that have been under a microscope as millennials have now taken up a majority of the workforce. This millennial and Gen Z push for lower impact lifestyles places a heavy emphasis on both quality of life and the overall employee experience.  

Pending changes to federal overtime limits also contribute to the conversation; the proposed rule would lift the salary threshold for overtime pay from $35,568 to $55,000. While it's unlikely that the average work week will be amended from 40 hours to 32 in the near future, these are conversations that our team can facilitate with our clients when it comes to company culture, compensation benchmarking, HR scorecards, and optimizing processes.