What is the average working hours per week

And a study in people found that those who worked longer hours had higher incidences of depression, anxiety, and poor sleep quality.

The dreaded worker's condition, burnout, was also linked to longer working hours in a study conducted in Japan. The research also suggested that longer work hours are linked to poor quality of life and poorer lifestyle choices, which could compound any health or mental health problems stemming from over-working. Productivity and creativity tend to plateau after a certain amount of hours.

In fact, working 70 hours or 55 would result in pretty much the same level of productiveness, they found. It makes little sense for employers to create tension by pressing for longer workdays so their employees can get more work done, Pencavel says.

And if people are working much, they simply don't have time to participate in civic life," she says. But shortening the workweek by a day may be of some wider benefit, she says. A four-day workweek would mean a drop in commuters on the fifth day of the week — potentially benefiting the environment, she says. At the same time, a shorter workweek might benefit certain demographics, like the elderly or small children.

Working-age carers would have more time to care for them at home, relieving pressure on public resources and private care.

The more time we spend at work the less time we have for other important things in life," she says. A good rule of thumb is to take at least one day off a week to not do any work at all — a seven-day workweek truly stifles productivity, Pencavel says. He would also like to see more experimentation on the part of employers as to how they structure their workweeks. It pays the employer to experiment with different work hours.

Kamerade-Hanta agrees. Calculate your pay for work on a rest day. Employment practices Home Employment practices Hours of work, overtime and rest day. Search query Clear search. Hours of work, overtime and rest day. Definitions Week — A continuous period of 7 days starting from Monday and ending on Sunday. Break times You are generally not required to work more than 6 consecutive hours without a break.

Normal hours of work Contractual working hours are the hours that you and your employer have agreed to in the contract of service. For common work arrangements , your contractual hours of work are as follows: If you work Your contractual hours of work are 5 days or less a week Up to 9 hours per day or 44 hours a week More than 5 days a week Up to 8 hours a day or 44 hours a week For other work arrangements , your contractual hours of work are as follows: If you work Your contractual hours of work are Less than 44 hours every alternate week Up to 48 hours a week, but capped at 88 hours in any continuous 2-week period.

Have the provisions of Sections 38 and 40 of the Employment Act explained to you. Be informed of your daily working hours, number of working days in each week and weekly rest day. Overtime pay Overtime work is all work in excess of the normal hours of work excluding breaks. Get your correct overtime pay on time. Work done beyond the contractual hours is considered overtime hours.

Find out how to prevent overtime pay disputes or claims. Related Salary Public holidays: entitlement and pay. Share this page Share this page on facebook Tweet this page Email this page Print this page. Related questions Must my rest day be on a Sunday? Average work hours in developed countries fell from 3, hours per year in to between 1, and 2, hours per year by But this long-term decline in average annual work hours has slowed down in almost all OECD countries, and occasionally reversed itself.

Interestingly, the work time in primitive hunter-gatherer societies is much lower than in modern agrarian societies. On average, a full-time employee in the European Union works In , the longest working hours are reported in Romania The statistics also show that in Belgium, the number of working hours for employees was By EU labor law ,, working hours are limited to 48 hours per week, including overtime if permitted by national law, you may have an agreement with a staff member to work beyond the hour limit.

On average, a full-time employee in the United Kingdom works 1, hours per year, or On average, a full-time employee in the United Stats works 1, hours per year, or For example, Europeans work up to 19 percent fewer hours annually compared to those working in the US.

For Americans that's hours extra per year, or about an hour per working day. In most of the world, the workweek is from Monday to Friday, but not everywhere. For example, in muslim-majority countries, workweek is from Sunday to Thursday.