Is NJ Ready For A 32 Hour Workweek? It Could Happen – Here’s How

NEW JERSEY — The 40-hour workweek hasn’t changed in the United States since the late 1930s. But although productivity is reportedly soaring across the nation – including New Jersey – the number of hours that employees are required to put in to be considered “full-time” has remained the same for decades.

It’s time to change that, supporters of a proposed federal law say.

On Thursday, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont was expected to introduce legislation to establish a standard 32-hour workweek in America – with no loss in pay. Learn more about his proposal here.

If it becomes law, the bill would force employers to pay overtime to non-salaried workers who exceed 32 hours per week, up from the current threshold of 40 hours. Employers would also have to pay workers overtime (at “time and a half”) for workdays longer than eight hours – and double their overtime pay for 12-hour days.

And yes, that includes New Jersey.

“Moving to a 32-hour workweek with no loss of pay is not a radical idea,” Sanders said. “Today, American workers are over 400 percent more productive than they were in the 1940s. And yet, millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages than they were decades ago.”

With another milestone advancement in technology taking place every day, it’s finally time to start putting these innovations to work for the lower and middle class – not just corporate CEOs and wealthy stockholders, the senator argued.

• See Related: Why Workers —And Employers— Need a 4-Day Work Week

Sanders isn’t the only one claiming that workers across the U.S. are becoming more productive on the job.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, productivity increased nearly 65 percent from 1979 to 2021, while wages increased just over 17 percent in that period.

In New Jersey, the average employee is among the most hardworking in the nation, some reports claim.

A recent study from business website Upflip.com analyzed the labor productivity data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics to see which states “added the most value to the economy” for every hour worked – making them the most “productive.” New Jersey ranked as the 8th-highest state in the study (New York ranked first, with Washington and Delaware placing second and third).

Some businesses in the Garden State have already begun experimenting with alternatives to the standard 40-hour workweek.

With employee shortages continuing to plague the restaurant industry, a restaurant in Camden County announced it was scaling back to a four-day workweek last year. It was a decision driven by the desire to create a better work-life balance for employees, offer more reliable wages and find a more sustainable business model

• See Related: NJ Restaurant Shifts To 4-Day Workweek, Rotating Menus
• See Related: NJ Raises Minimum Wage To $15 – But It Still Isn't Enough To Live On

Other states’ workplaces that have made the switch have also reported success.

In Colorado, the Golden Police Department recently switched its employees to a four-day workweek – while still paying for 40 hours. The department found that police recorded average faster response times for calls during all six months of the pilot compared to the same timeframe in 2022.

Many workplaces in New Jersey are already using artificial intelligence to improve productivity, a recent study says. According to AI productivity platform Plus Docs, which analyzed Google searches over the last 12 months related to using AI for work tasks, New Jersey averaged the 10th-highest monthly searches per 100,000 residents at 46.1, which is 21 percent higher than the national average of 38.1 searches per 100,000 people.

SHORTER WORKWEEK: YES OR NO?

Changing up the workweek has seen support from some online pundits in New Jersey.

When a commenter posed this question on Reddit last year – “A four-day workweek could be ‘life changing.’ Should New Jersey get it?” – it sparked several replies in the affirmative, including:

• “My company went to 4-day work weeks for 8 months last year. I have no idea why they stopped. Things were going great. Even the CEO said he was surprised at how well it was going on a company conference call.”
• “Absolutely, as long as it's 4x8 hours, not 4x10 hours. We need to work fewer days and fewer hours, not just fewer days.”
• “40 hours is such an arbitrary amount of time especially in today’s day and age for most corporate jobs. My job, based in NYC could 100 percent move to 4 days, 8 hours a day, and my productivity would not change at all. There are numerous times a day I end up just sitting there but I have to be online in case something comes up.”
• “Just think of how glorious an extra weekend day would be.”

Some people are much more cautious about shortening the workweek, however.

“By squeezing four days into 32 hours, you’re now increasing goal difficulty (because you’ve decreased the time available to complete the original goal) by a lot—a whopping 20% overnight,” an associate professor of management and human resources at the Wisconsin School of Business said last year.

“As someone who studies organizational behavior and motivation, I would argue that even if this is possible, which is debatable, it may not be healthy for employees,” he added.

Other experts have argued that a shorter workweek could force businesses to hire more workers at a time when labor is at a premium, and prevent people who want to work overtime from getting as many hours as they want. Meanwhile, labor costs could rise, they say.

ACROSS AMERICA

Other federal efforts to change the Fair Labor Standards Act in favor of a shorter workweek have taken place in recent years, including one launched by U.S. Rep. Mark Takano of California last year.

“Workers across the nation are collectively reimagining their relationship to labor — and our laws need to follow suit,” Takano said. “We have before us the opportunity to make common sense changes to work standards passed down from a different era.”

• See Related: Push For 4-Day Workweek Reignited By CA Congressman

Other efforts to change the 40-hour week on the state level have taken place in Pennsylvania, where Rep. G. Roni Green recently pitched legislation that would require businesses with more than 500 employees to reduce the workweek from 40 hours to 32, without a reduction in pay. Read More: 4-Day Workweek Being Proposed By Philadelphia State Rep

“Workers deserve to have a weekly schedule that respects a balance of work and personal responsibilities,” Green wrote. “A four-day workweek would provide hardworking individuals with more time for rest, family obligations, and focus on both physical and mental health. Rested, happy and healthy workers in turn can better focus on work and accomplish more in a workday.”

• See Related: 3 NJ Companies Make More In An Hour Than You Earn In A Lifetime
• See Related: NJ Workers Are Owed $5.7 Billion In 'Unpaid Overtime,' Report Says

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