The rise of the 4-day workweek

Against a worldwide backdrop of workplace change, one bold idea continues to gain momentum. Proponents of the 4-day workweek argue that employees, businesses, and society at large would be better off with one less day at work.

The movement is part of a larger conversation about the balance between work and nonwork time, said Lonnie Golden, PhD, a professor of economics and labor and employment relations at Penn State Abington who studies determinants of worker well-being. Those questions intensified during and following the pandemic, including national and global debates about work-life balance, employee flexibility and autonomy, and who should benefit (or might stand to lose) from new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI).

“The pandemic gave employees the opportunity to explore what flexible work looked like, and many saw the huge benefits of that,” said Dale Whelehan, PhD, a behavioral scientist and CEO at 4 Day Week Global, an advocacy organization that runs 4-day workweek trials around the world.

Four-day workweeks have been growing in popularity in the United States for decades, with their incidence tripling among full-time workers between 1973 and 2018 (Hamermesh, D. S., & Biddle, J. E., ILR Review, advance online publication, 2023opens in new window). In 2024, 22% of respondents to APA’s Work in America survey said their employer offered a 4-day workweek, compared with just 14% in 2022 (2024 Work in America Survey: Psychological Safety in the Changing Workplace, APA, 2024).

To be clear, not all 4-day workweeks are created equal. Some models compress 40 hours into 4 days, while others reduce weekly hours while providing full pay and benefits.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, employees are largely enthusiastic about both types of 4-day workweeks, with about 80% of Work in America survey respondents saying they believe they would be happier and just as effective with 4 days at work. Some policymakers are also behind the push. Since 2023, both Representative Mark Takano and Senator Bernie Sanders have introduced bills that would reduce the standard workweek to 32 hours. Sanders and others argue that the shift would give the working class, including those who cannot do their jobs remotely, a share in the benefits of recent technological advances and economic growth.

Research, so far led mainly by economists and sociologists, is still in its early stages. Trials show gains in worker well-being and satisfaction, as well as improvements in retention and recruitment, with most companies who try a 4-day week choosing to continue with the model. Critics caution that data is still limited and that longitudinal, randomized studies are needed to better assess outcomes.

“With their expertise in measuring engagement and well-being, as well as identifying individual differences, psychologists should have a role in weighing whether 4-day workweeks are beneficial overall and where there may be nuances,” said Dennis Stolle, JD, PhD, senior director of applied psychology at APA.

Psychology can answer questions about 4-day workweeks, he said, and contribute to the larger conversation about the future of work. How can research help us respond to the changing world in a way that serves employees across sectors, helps businesses succeed, and boosts society overall?

The 4-day workweek can take several different forms. In the reduced hours approach, endorsed by Senator Sanders and 4 Day Week Global, employees work four 8-hour days. Sometimes called the “100-80-100” model, workers get 100% of their pay to work 80% of the time while maintaining 100% of the productivity.

In the compressed hours model, employees receive full pay for working four 10-hour days. A 1999 meta-analysis of this approach found higher performance ratings and job satisfaction but no changes in absenteeism or productivity (Baltes, B. B., et al. Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 84, No. 4, 1999opens in new window). In a 2020 case study, where the Canadian township of Zorra, Ontario, tested the model with its government employees, 73% of those who participated said they would continue working a compressed week if given the chance (Spicer, Z., & Lyons, J., State and Local Government Review, Vol. 55, No. 1, 2023opens in new window).

But research results on compressed workweeks are inconsistent, with some experts sounding the alarm that longer workdays could be detrimental to employee health and are nearly impossible for parents with primary caregiving responsibilities. (Compressed workweeks are common in certain sectors, including health care, and extensive research has explored them from a safety and efficacy perspective.) A 2024 study of 247 construction company workers found that overall, switching to a compressed workweek improved work-life harmony and did not increase fatigue, but those benefits were largely mediated by employee expectations. People who thought the new schedule would improve their life tended to benefit; those with low expectations did not (Mühl, A., & Korunka, C., European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 33, No. 5, 2024opens in new window).

Since 2022, 4 Day Week Global has partnered with researchers around the world to spearhead a series of pilot studies of the reduced hours (100-80-100) workweek. The 6-month trials, which began in Ireland and the United States, have now expanded across Europe and to South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and beyond. 4 Day Week Global provides up-front guidance and resources for work reorganization, while independent researchers collect pre- and postdata on worker well-being, organizational performance, and more.

Across trials at more than 200 companies, workers reported better mental and physical health, life satisfaction, and positive affect, as well as less stress, burnout, fatigue, and work-family conflict. Those gains held fairly stable in a 12-month follow-up (Assessing Global Trials of Reduced Work Time With No Reduction in Pay, 4 Day Week Global, 2022; The 4 Day Week Long-Term Pilot Report, 4 Day Week Global, 2023).

“So far, the results are fairly consistent across companies and across countries, and fairly positive. We see overwhelming evidence that workers’ well-being improved greatly from the beginning to the end of the trial,” said Wen Fan, PhD, an associate professor of sociology at Boston College, who is one of the lead researchers of the U.S. 4 Day Week Global trials along with economist and sociologist Juliet Schor, PhD, also of Boston College. Workers were extremely satisfied with the trial, Fan added, with between 10% and 15% of participants in each pilot reporting that no amount of money could persuade them to return to a 5-day workweek.

What’s more surprising, Fan said, is that most business leaders were also highly satisfied at the end of the trials. Many saw improvements in retention and recruitment, savings on sick time, and revenue gains. At the end of the 6-month pilot, companies gave the trial an average rating of 9 on a scale of 0 to 10.

“The most consistent finding is that most companies who embark on a 4-day week trial continue on with it,” Whelehan said. “That alone speaks to the value of this, not just for health but also for business.”

Advocates of the reduced-hours model, including Senator Sanders, say it can offer a degree of flexibility to employees in industries where remote work is not possible. That could make flexible work, currently more common in white-collar professions, accessible across the workforce. Already, 4-day workweeks are more common among workers who are younger, less educated, nonunion, and male. They are also more common among restaurant workers, health care workers, and first responders (Hamermesh, D. S., & Biddle, J. E., “Days of Work Over a Half Century: The Rise of the Four-Day Week,” NBER Working Paper 30106, 2022).

More flexible work arrangements, including the adoption of a 4-day week, could also improve gender equity in the workplace. Research by Claudia Goldin, PhD, a professor of economics at Harvard University who won the Nobel Prize in Economics for her work on the gender pay gap, shows how pay inequity is linked to the conflict between childcare responsibilities and inflexible work, including the need to work a strict schedule in a specific location (Hours Flexibility and the Gender Gap in Pay, Center for American Progress, 2015).

A third model for the 4-day workweek, largely rejected by researchers and advocates, involves both part-time employment (for example, four 8-hour days) and reduced pay. A recent survey by Golden and his colleagues through the Project for Middle Class Renewal found that 42% of full-time employees were willing to take a pay cut for a 4-day workweek, though this option skews toward benefiting employers. This approach is generally seen as a disinvestment in the workforce; employees working under this arrangement typically do not receive full-time benefits.

At the heart of the 4-day workweek is a degree of trust between employer and employee, and the sense that an organization wants the best for its people, said Joseph Lyons, PhD, an assistant professor of political science at Western University in Ontario, Canada, who studied the public sector trial in the township of Zorra.

“If organizational culture was not good beforehand, the 4-day workweek is not going to be some sort of panacea,” he said.

While the findings from such trials look impressive, researchers warn that the results are preliminary and that more rigorous studies are needed to assess potential downsides. A 2023 systematic review of the literature on 4-day workweeks found support for improvements in morale, job satisfaction, and job turnover, but it also identified some negative impacts, including scheduling problems, more intense performance and monitoring measures, and a risk of benefits fading over time (Campbell, T. T., Management Review Quarterly, Vol. 74, 2024opens in new window).

“It’s still early. I would be cautious about some of these data points that are just starting to come out,” said Tammy Allen, PhD, a distinguished university professor of psychology at the University of South Florida who has studied flexible work arrangements for more than 20 years. “One thing we need to study is a potential ‘honeymoon effect.’ Early on, this seems fantastic, but as time goes on, it may lose its shine a bit.”

Allen said that experimental studies, such as a large randomized controlled trial, could help provide stronger evidence for the 4-day workweek and look more closely at factors such as absenteeism and productivity.

Another limitation of the current research is selection bias: Most companies that agree to participate in a 4-day workweek trial may already have some evidence that the arrangement will work for their business, Fan said.

“Government support could help us collect more robust evidence, for example, tax incentives that can help motivate a variety of organizations to enroll,” she said.

Measuring productivity is another challenge and one that can vary substantially from one organization or industry to the next. “In this context, the hardest thing to measure objectively is productivity, so effects on well-being and satisfaction are going to be much clearer,” Golden said.

Equipping companies to track output in ways that are meaningful to them could also help reduce potential downsides of the 4-day workweek, such as increased employee tracking.

Businesses have played an important early part in demonstrating the possibilities of the 4-day workweek, Whelehan said, but the path forward requires new partnerships with academic researchers and government funders.

“Where academics continue to play the most critical role is in lobbying government for public-sector trials or government-sponsored private sector trials,” he said.

More research is certainly needed, and psychological scientists can be a big part of the solution. They can help collect data on engagement, well-being, and long-term outcomes, as well as individual differences in 4-day workweeks—for example, do they work particularly well for certain occupations, life circumstances, organizational structures, or personality types?

Psychologists can also use their theoretical knowledge, including concepts such as self-determination and autonomy, to help explore the mechanisms behind 4-day workweek benefits, Fan said.

“Are we seeing benefits simply because this frees up more time for yourself or your family?” she said. “That’s one explanation, but another is that it’s not just the reduction in hours but also the sense that the company really cares about us.”

As part of the larger conversation about remote work, the 4-day workweek may also be just part of a long-term solution. Deciding where it fits will require more research but also a broader discussion of societal priorities and values, Golden said.

For example, if AI can take on some job tasks, who should benefit: businesses (by cutting staff), employees (by working less), or both? Simply substituting AI for employees is a short-term solution, Whelehan said, and one that may initially save money but ultimately lead to widespread unemployment. That hurts employers, too, who would likely pay higher taxes for social services, he said. For that reason, it’s in the inherent interest of both employers and the government to ensure employment remains high.

“The new frontier requires us to answer a question,” Golden said. “What do we, as a society, want to do to improve job quality and the well-being of workers without sacrificing productivity?”