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The Almighty Buck United Kingdom United States

Americans Work 25% More Than Europeans, Study Finds (bloomberg.com) 404

Americans are addicted to their jobs. U.S. workers not only put in more hours than workers do almost anywhere else. They're also increasingly retiring later and taking fewer vacation days, reports Bloomberg. From the article: A new study tries to measure precisely how much more Americans work than Europeans do overall. The answer: The average person in Europe works 19 percent less than the average person in the U.S. That's about 258 fewer hours per year, or about an hour less each weekday. Another way to look at it: U.S. workers put in almost 25 percent more hours than Europeans. Hours worked vary a lot by country, according to the unpublished working paper by economists Alexander Bick of Arizona State University, Bettina Bruggemann of McMaster University in Ontario, and Nicola Fuchs-Schundeln of Goethe University Frankfurt. Swiss work habits are most similar to Americans', while Italians are the least likely to be at work, putting in 29 percent fewer hours per year than Americans do.
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Americans Work 25% More Than Europeans, Study Finds

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  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:31AM (#53100073)

    I mean bragging about our victory over socialized medicine is fun and all..

    • That's easy (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:39AM (#53100171)

      What do they have to show for it? That depends on whether you fit in.

      If you fit in, you've got money to show for it.

      If you don't fit in, you've got nothing to show for it.

      • Re:That's easy (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Timothy2.0 ( 4610515 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @12:17PM (#53101279)
        It's the end result of the Prosperity Gospel.

        Those on the "outside" are conditioned to believe that, with enough hard work and effort, they'll eventually be on the "inside". However, those on the inside create policies to keep those on the outside, *outside*. Despite this, people still make decisions (i.e., voting) with the belief that they *might* become part o that inside group, ignoring the present (or even future) realities.

        It's fantastic social propaganda, though. The economy exploits the increased productivity (assuming, of course, more work hours equates to comparable economic gains; we all know that person that does 3 hours of work in an 8 hour shift), while kindling hope in a population that prosperity is just around the corner if they just keep working harder.
    • From the industrial revolution until Nixon Shock, the standard of living was on a steady rise.

      Nixon made changes to monetary policy so that ever since then the standard of living has been basically frozen and all improvements to productivity go to corporate profits.

      Even most households going to 2 income still have the same basic standard of living despite contributing twice as much to the workforce.

      In Europe, the extra productivity went to a combination of more profits and shorter hours.

      A side e
  • Misleading results (Score:5, Informative)

    by dysmal ( 3361085 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:35AM (#53100123)

    Working more does not necessarily mean more productivity. It's especially hard to be productive when you're burning your limited PTO/vacation allotments for unplanned family illnesses rather than... you know... planned restful downtime.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      In this case, though, it does. Americans have one of highest productivity per person in world.

      I'm not saying it's a good thing, but it's true. Personally. I use ALL my vacation and rarely work more than my allotted time (I work in internal medicine, so I do 7 on and 7 off).

      http://www.news.com.au/nationa... [news.com.au]

      • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:56AM (#53100347)

        I am very interested in how they defined the productivity per worker. The article does not state that. From the numbers they show, my gut feeling is that they simply divided the gross national product by the number of employees, which is a wildly inaccurate way of defining productivity. Norway is not significantly more productive than Sweden or Denmark - it just has a lot of oil and those two countries do not. The relative sizes of the financial sector in different countries adds a similar distortion and there are many more factors to consider. How much a worker actually contributes to productivity is very hard to measure objectively. The GDP per worker does not tell much of that story.

        • The standard accepted approach in economics is to use Total Factor Productivity. You can read about it here: http://www.people.hbs.edu/dcom... [hbs.edu]
        • I am very interested in how they defined the productivity per worker.

          It is GDP (usually adjusted by PPP) divided by total hours worked by all workers in the country.

          my gut feeling is that they simply divided the gross national product by the number of employees, which is a wildly inaccurate way

          No. That is NOT what productivity means.

          Norway is not significantly more productive than Sweden or Denmark - it just has a lot of oil and those two countries do not.

          Productivity does NOT mean "working hard". Offshore oil workers may not "work harder" than, say, farmers, but they are likely to contribute far more to GDP, and are thus more productive.

        • by tomhath ( 637240 )
          The article only discusses hours worked per capita. That means countries with high unemployment rates like Italy and France have a lower hours worked metric; productivity is entirely different.
      • by Thud457 ( 234763 )
        Yeah, but what has increasing worker productivity gained us? [epi.org]
        TL;DR - since ~1973, diddly-squat if you're a worker, pretty sweet if you own the place. Let's give those heroic jerb creators another tax break!
        • Well, the stupid one is the one who is a worker, not the employer. Quit your job, and create your own company if you're smart. Having hired people to work for me, it isn't as easy as it sounds, and should pay more than simply showing up to work stoned and hungover.

          The whiners of the world will always complain, and want government to pass laws preventing successful people from being successful. Instead of asking for government to make it easier to own your own business, the idiots are making it harder and ha

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @11:13AM (#53100501) Homepage Journal

      We will soon find out, I fear. The UK has already been talking about which employee rights will be removed once it leaves the EU. Time off proportional to overtime looks like it will be the first thing to go, but they keep talking about making the UK more "competitive", by which they of course mean lower wages, longer hours and fewer expenses like safety equipment and adaptations for people with disabilities.

      So it is likely we will find out just what that does to productivity soon, giving us an opportunity to compare the EU and US models.

  • by Joe_Dragon ( 2206452 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:36AM (#53100133)

    Need more unions and workers rights!

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Maybe Americans need to live in a framework that allows them to walk away from hostile work environments. To put it another way, I don't think most Americans would be satisfied by the materialistic aspects of European life and due to this pursuit we're suffering for it. Until our conceptions of what it means to lead a successful and good life changes we're doomed to repeat the same cycle of consumerism. Each concept has its own pros and cons, choose wisely.

      • by jedidiah ( 1196 )

        > Maybe Americans need to live in a framework that allows them to walk away from hostile work environments.

        That's called self-discipline.

        Americans have more choices. They can chose to be vulnerable or not. We make more, keep more, and our currency goes farther. We just have a consumer culture that encourages blowing it all.

        Even ghetto children have this fixation on overpriced status symbols.

  • Only Logical (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:36AM (#53100135)

    As Americans measure everything by size and not quality, I am not surprised by this. My USA counterparts are much more at the office, and producing less work than the continental ones. Make a study about effectiveness and I am your man!

    • Unless you happen to be in Norway (the only European country with a higher per-hour productivity than the US) you're just spewing anecdotes. As a whole, Americans work longer AND are more productive than almost any European country - at least according to the UN. http://www.news.com.au/nationa... [news.com.au]

      I won't say that this is necessarily a good thing. I will say that your arrogance appears misplaced.

    • I think it is interesting to see and note. It's data. More data gives you more things to compare. We aren't exactly comparing like for like here. The US is huge. Yet it is compared to European countries, some of which are tiny. Look, we're different. So that we work more is just a data point, and judgement shouldn't be passed down on that data alone. The type of work is relevant as well.

      Moreover, how do other places like Japan or China or Australia compare? We likely won't have comparable data, so

  • by roman_mir ( 125474 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:37AM (#53100147) Homepage Journal

    Americans have to work more hours and take fewer vacation days because they are poorer at this point, given that USA is running 500,000,000,000 a year trade deficit and has been running that for 2 decades now, Americans cannot afford anything, they are completely stuck in debt and their government in concert with the Federal reserve are destroying the value of their money, value of theirs savings every days. Government spending and money printing, pushing interest rates down to keep borrowing more by doing things like 'operation twist' (the Fed buying long term bonds at negative real interest rates because nobody else would), all of this is expanding the money supply making USD less valuable all the time, thus making Americans less productive every day.

    The only way out of this insanity is to restructure the debts, an honest default on the USD denominated debt, stopping all government spending (yes, this means all wars, all SS payments, all Medicare payments, everything). You have to clear away all of your debts, allow the bond holders to lose money so that the interest rates would reset to normal levels (only real market without government intervention can set real interest rates). Get the government out of your money because otherwise you will never have vacations or retirement savings or anything.

    • You're correct, roman_mir, but this isn't a US-specific problem. There's Japan, EU, etc. It's a rolling disaster for the so-called liberal capitalist democracies.

      What's disheartening is that public anger over the dismal outcomes of this inflationary fiscal policy manifests itself in bizarre and ineffective forms, like Trump. The Fed, meanwhile, continues as usual, while Congress ignores its constitutional responsibility to coin money and regulate its value.

      • Not an EU problem (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        EU overall trades at a *profit*. There may be some of the smaller countries struggling (notably Greece) but overall EU does not have to internally inflates its economy with QE.

        This is a problem with a few key economies that run at huge deficits and go the easy short-term route of internally inflating their economies. Japan had it for decades, US followed, UK joined them.

    • by cvdwl ( 642180 )
      Oddly, the USD has risen sharply against the Euro over the last few years. Unfortunately for me, one of those slacker Americans working in Europe and enjoying my 6 weeks of vacation a year.
    • by LynnwoodRooster ( 966895 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @11:13AM (#53100509) Journal

      It's not just the trade deficit, it's the spending we have to support as well. Even though the Federal Government took more than $10,000 per man, woman, and child (about $26,400 per worker - about $13.20 per hour worked in the US), it still spent $1,423,000,000,000 more than it took in (an additional $5.69 per hour worked). We have a LOT of Government to support - there are career politicians and crony capitalists to support after all!

      Sources: number of workers, 124.73 million [statista.com]. Federal revenues: $3.3 trillion [usgovernmentrevenue.com]. Federal debt added FY2016: $1.423 trillion [treasurydirect.gov]

    • by ADRA ( 37398 )

      *psst* lowering the value of money helps you pay back your debt *psst*

      Most of your held debt is spent on armed forces (as a whole), armed forced pensions/medicaid, interest, etc.. which one do you ever see being cut? Europe had people in pitch-forks because the only things they could realistically cut were social services, education, medical, etc.. When the US gov starts cutting veteran's pensions and health, what do you see the outcome being?

      Certainly scaling back new armed forced recruiting is a pretty go

    • by sjames ( 1099 )

      Yeah, just starve those retired fuckers in the streets. That'll make things better. No way they'll take up rifles and fix their situations.

      We'll just get us some government death panels to decide who has to go.

      We could get a long way by terminating our endless war in the middle east and billing the chickenhawks and their friends for the odious debt they ran up for personal benefit.

    • I guess that means I'm way worse off.

    • by swb ( 14022 )

      If this is true, how do you account for the never ending ability to sell Treasuries denominated in US Dollars?

      If there was some concerted effort to devalue the US dollar, wouldn't that make it ridiculous to hold Treasuries which paid off in US dollars? There has always been an existential risk associated with this -- the US in theory has always had the ability to sell Treasuries, spend the money and then print money to pay them off, but has never directly done this, or at least not on a scale that deviates

  • We get vacation?? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:38AM (#53100159)

    Wage slave here. Recently changed jobs (moved) and new company gives only 8 days a year vacation+Personal Holiday+mandatory holiday. I would love to work less... My wife and I are still discussing if we could afford for me to be Mr. Mom and her to work (she does make 2x what I make)... Lately I have been working the actual hours I get paid for, and have even been taking all of the breaks I am entitled to, but nobody ever takes, and my life satisfaction has gone way up. It's not that most americans are addicted to their job, it's that they are made to feel that if they don't work 120% of the hours they are "paid to work" then they will look like slackers and be let go.

    • It's a regional thing too... on the east coast many of us wouldn't leave until 6 or 7. Live in southwest now and people work a straight eight.
    • by ADRA ( 37398 )

      '"paid to work" then they will look like slackers and be let go'

      The total losers attitude. I've always been at least as competent as the average in my groups and I've never shed a tear working the exact time (or less) than I'm supposed to. I get my work done and my reviews are as glowing as always. I get promoted, get raises, and if I'm not I find new companies that do.

      Certainly if you've been over-promoted into a position you aren't qualified / competent in, you may have to work your ass off to maintain it

    • Come to Europe.

      In most countries minimum vacation per year is by law 30 days. And no, you can not be forced by contract to give up days on that.

      Most countries have free or partly public funded kinder gardens etc. public transport for school kids low crime rates. Chances are you never meet one who ever witnessed or suffered from a crime.

      Bottom line you have less hassle with your life ... best places are of course Denmark, Netherlands or other nordic countries, Germany and France and depending on your touch f

  • by Captain Centropyge ( 1245886 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:39AM (#53100165)
    It's highly unlikely that we're addicted to our jobs. It's not usually by any choice that someone will work more and get less vacation. This is a cultural issue that's being pushed on the working classes by employers. I'd love to have a mandatory month of vacation and see everyone work less than 40 hours per week, as they tend to do in Europe.
  • by Oxygen99 ( 634999 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:40AM (#53100191)
    Pfft. Get back to me when hours worked equals productivity.
  • Americans don't like to work. We're trying to survive with rising costs, leaps in inflation of everyday goods.

    And this only scrapes the surface, I wager Americans also spend a significant greater amount of time commuting to work than their western European counterparts.

  • I work in government IT. My contract prohibits me from working more than 40 hours a week. I get paid federal holidays, 20 Paid Time Off (PTO) days and five unpaid day offs. No gold-plated pension and/or watch, however. I also make 50% less than my Silicon Valley counterparts in the public sector. But I'm well rested. ;)
  • Which is why a lot of people have two jobs, and two jobs is almost becoming a requirement. That certainly doesn't mean better productivity, and when you consider the US has the dollar, which is the world's reserve currency, a future where that is no longer the case is pretty alarming.
    • by sjames ( 1099 )

      That says nothing about productivity. It says a lot about where the benefits of that productivity accrue (hint, not to the people working 2 jobs).

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @10:57AM (#53100349)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I mean, if you think adding 1 hour more a day (8 becomes 9) is a 25% increase in hours, you need to go back and do a little recalculating...
  • Relevance? (Score:5, Informative)

    by kamakazi ( 74641 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @11:11AM (#53100497)

    Buried in all the statisics abuse in the summaries there is a paper of significance only to historians. This paper is based on numbers for 2005-2007, before the financial crisis.

    It also does not reflect work per person, but work for a theoretical average person age 15-64. Employment rate is a component of this person, so as employment rate drops so does the hours this average person works.

    Actually, that feels intuitively wrong, the ~25 hours per week in the US seems way too high when employment rate is factored in, but I am not interested enough in how much we all worked 10 years ago to read the paper more carefully.

    Besides, I don't have time for this, I have to get back to work.

  • addicted ? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @11:26AM (#53100671)

    Americans are addicted to their jobs. U.S. workers not only put in more hours than workers do almost anywhere else. They're also increasingly retiring later and taking fewer vacation days, ...

    Perhaps we're just afraid of being unemployed and destitute. Employers show little loyalty to their employees (Pro Tip: If your company says "employees are our most valuable asset" start looking for another job.), the social safety net is not as strong as in Europe and it's clear that our politicians don't really care about the poor and (arguably) middle class -- look at the various budgets, including the latest Republican House budget which gets 62% from low/moderate income programs while also including tax cuts for the wealthy. (see below).

    House GOP Budget Gets 62 Percent of Budget Cuts From Low- and Moderate-Income Programs [cbpp.org]

  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @11:34AM (#53100775)

    We are NOT addicted to our jobs. We HAVE to work 25% more than everyone else to KEEP our jobs, because workers in the US have ZERO protection against anti-competitive, inhumane, and employment practices that are ILLEGAL in Europe.

    We have to compete with workers in countries where there are no labor laws, no environmental standards, no minimum wages, no nothing. We have to compete with people who are essentially state-owned slaves. We're trying to break out in the lead in the race to the bottom, because if we don't, we lose our jobs to one of those people.

    And, our own government is leading the charge. So-called "liberals" and their banker buddies have been trying to make indentured servants of middle class America for ages - ever since the New Deal, all while claiming to want to "help."

    Help us how, exactly? By making it prohibitively expensive to do things in the US? By imposing onerous and overbearing regulations that don't make sense? By telling me that slinging burgers at McDonalds is economically equivalent to the job I do that I spend $100K on a degree for? Please.

    Some regulation is necessary, of course. There is a "right" amount that makes working safe and effective, and that levels the playing field. But, we surpassed that long ago. Today it is an active assault by government on entrepreneurship and individual success.

    I've voted for Democrats all my life. As a black man I took it as my duty, having been told by my father who grew up during the Civil Rights Movement that Democrats were the only ones who fought for minority rights. I now know that my father was hoodwinked, and I refuse to be hoodwinked as well.

  • by El_Muerte_TDS ( 592157 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @11:36AM (#53100819) Homepage

    The fact that a lot of people in the US have multiple jobs working many hours just to be able to buy food and pay rent is not something you should be proud of.

  • It should read "American spend 25% more time at work than worker Europe". My experience working and watching various type of environment, is that at the end of the day, your average US worker did the same work as your average Europe worker, just in a longer time.
  • by TheSync ( 5291 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2016 @12:04PM (#53101147) Journal

    From Work and Leisure in the U.S. and Europe: Why So Different? [nber.org], hours worked by Europeans and Americans were about the same in the 1960's, although the number of hours were dropping for all every year. In about 1980, the US and Europe diverged, with hours continuing to drop in Europe, but the US plateauing.

    Two reasons have been explored. The first is due to tax differences, and indeed labor taxes have been rising in the EU since the end of the 1960's. The other is differences in labor regulations, such as the requirement for contracts, limitations in legal working hours (such as the 35 hour workweek established in 2000 in France).

Don't tell me how hard you work. Tell me how much you get done. -- James J. Ling

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