Approval by the Chilean Congress on reduced working days in the country from 45 to 40 hours, with the additional possibility of implementing a four-day work week improve the figure new flexibility tool.

The proposal, which was approved by the Chamber of Deputies after unanimous approval in the Senate, gradually reducing working hours over five years, making it the Latin American country with the shortest working week along with Ecuador, published by BBC Mundo.

The implementation gradient is configured as follows. One year after implementation, the working day will be reduced to 44 hours per week. After three years the limit will be 42 hours and after five years it will be up to 40 hours, which is the working time recommended by the International Labor Organization (ILO). It also reduced the number of hours of overtime allowed per week, from the current 12 to 5.

The law provides for the possibility of four days of work and three breaks (unlike current law, which requires a minimum of five business days).

The reform was presented in 2017 by then deputy Camila Vallejo, who is currently minister of the Secretariat General of Government Gabriel Boric -here along with minister of Labor and Women-, and allowed a 4-day working day.

Profit

According to experiments conducted around the world, the four-day week not only improves working conditions and quality of life for workers, but also ultimately benefit the company. Among some of the items we can quote:

* More happiness: Being able to reconcile and have more space with your personal life is part of the emotional payoff which, as entrepreneur José Luis Casero explains, “goes beyond the paycheck and you have to take care of it”, because deductions contribute to greater performance. In fact, more and more companies care about their workers.

* Less absent: By eliminating stress and fatigue (signs of work ‘burn out’), chances of mistakes, accidents and sick leave are reduced, along with reasonable working hours.

* Greater commitment: good working conditions promote “organizational citizenship” behavior; that is, practices such as “assisting a colleague or client without being asked.”

* Economic benefits: By having more free time, consumption increases. In addition, the fact of having to pay for fewer light or phone hours reduces costs in the company.

advanced

Europe has taken several steps to advance in this new modality. Last Thursday, the Official Gazette published an allocation of 9.6 million euros in subsidies for industrial enterprises – automobiles, food processing and preservation, clothing and footwear manufacturing and graphic arts – and those with fewer than 250 employees, who cut at least 10% of the working day and keep their workers’ wages for two years. The turnover of these companies cannot exceed 50 million euros per year or their annual balance sheet cannot exceed 43 million, the official publication clarifies.

The Valencian community is the one that has taken the most steps so far. Last year the socialist government of Ximo Puig agreed to help companies up to 9,000 euros in three years for each worker who reduces the working day to 32 hours a week without reducing their wages.

With these steps, Spain is the only country in the world that has developed a public policy on this subject in such a powerful way. Iceland sets regulations for the public sector, whereas in other countries, such as the UK, USA or New Zealand, trials have been promoted by several companies.

But it is clear that more and more companies are proposing a four-day workday. “We are consolidating a debate that has been forgotten for decades, even though it has become one of the classic issues of the labor movement. This is a debate that has a lot of importance because of its relation to environmental or social issues, such as mental health,” admits Joan Sanchis, professor of Applied Economics at the University of Valencia, adviser to the Department of Sustainable Economics Generalitat Valenciana and author of a publication advocating a four-day work day.

Returning to the case of Chile, Fabio Bertranou, director of the ILO’s regional office in Santiago, told BBC Mundo that the law takes into account special regimes for sectors requiring extraordinary working hours, such as mining or transportation.

In these cases, employees will be allowed to work shifts of up to 52 hours per week, provided they later have more days off to compensate.

“Law considers the possibility of 40 hours per week achieved by making an average of four weeks. So, if you work more a week, the important thing is to give an average of 40,” he explained.

With this law, Chile became the second country in Latin America, after Ecuador, to approve the work week recommended by the ILO.

Comparison

Following this agreement, Chile is aligned with most of the other 38 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries in that a 40-hour work week also applies.

The only exception is Australia, Belgium, Denmark, France and the Netherlands, where less than 40 hours are worked, and Germany, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ireland, Israel, Mexico, United Kingdom, Switzerland and Turkey, where more work was done.

If we make a global comparison, average weekly hours worked in Latin America and the Caribbean (39.9 hours) it was significantly less than in Arab countries (44.6 hours), Asia-Pacific (47.4 hours), East Asia (48.8 hours) and South Asia (49 hours).

Bertranou highlighted that Chile’s labor reforms were achieved thanks to the fact that “a space for dialogue was opened with the business sector” and there was a consensus among Chileans about the importance of “taking time to have more family life and to be better.” can enjoy public space”.

According to the ILO, which approved its convention of a 40-hour work week in 1935, working more increases the number of work accidents and health problemsbut that doesn’t guarantee more productivity, because of more fatigue.

“Latin America has lagging laws on working hours and it is imperative to make revisions,” suggested Bertranou.