World Economic Forum Wants The World To Abandon Working On Friday And Adopt A 4-Day Work Week

As technology continues to grow and replace physical bodies in all forms of work, and the general malaise and laziness sets in because of ever-increasing convenience, groups like the World Economic Forum want us to believe it is now time for the world to begin shifting away for the traditional 5-day work week, and rather minimize it down to only four.

The WEF presented this concept on Thursday, January 19th, in a session called “The Four-Day Week;” which looked at, “Recent large-scale experiments suggest that workers’ hours can be cut without a corresponding drop in output. Can the four-day work week address some of the most urgent problems in the 21st-century world of work?,” the WEF wrote.

The session was hosted by Adam Grant, a Saul P. Steinberg Professor of Management and Psychology at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Other speakers included:

• Christy Hoffman – General Secretary of the UNI Global Union
• Sander van ’t Noordende – Chief Executive Officer and Chair of the Executive Board for Randstad N.V.
• Karien van Gennip – Minister of Social Affairs and Employment, Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment of the Netherlands

Grant jokingly began the discussion by saying, “We’re going to try and get some of you to rethink your stances here and change some behaviors.”

As an American I’d really like to know how we can work less.

Grant cheerfully said to the panel

Grant noted that Western Europe is leading the charge for this shift though other nations here and there have tried to test out this concept.

This idea, however, isn’t anything necessarily new. In November of 2019 Inc. published a short piece promoting the idea of a 4-day work week, titled “It’s Official: We Should All Stop Working on Fridays, According to Microsoft.”

The WEF and other organizations involved seem to have nothing really bad to say about this concept, rattling-off a plethora of positives and nearly no cons if any.

Gennip talked about how this will also drive female empowerment and independency, while allowing more men to takeover the traditional roles of women such as a childcare.

I strongly believe when you have more time off you will be more productive in hours that you work.

She later added

Noordende explained how they just launched their “work monitor” at Randstad, and 50% reportedly say they are willing to quit their work if they are not happen – implying that a 4-day week could be make schedules more flexible and potentially make staff happier.

Interestingly enough, Hoffman insinuated that America and U.S. workers are very much behind on this concept and reducing workdays, asserting “there really isn’t enough demand in the [U.S.] to have leisure time,” and said that the “three-week vacation is almost unheard of in the [U.S.].”

Prior to their discussion mainstream media had already greased the wheels of Americans and Western audiences for this concept. Insider – who lauded the benefits of population reduction in a separate post last year, as cited by The WinePress – ran a headline gushing over the benefits of only working four days compared to the normal 5-6.

Insider had this to say (excerpts):

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The results are in: It’s time for your company to stop working on Fridays (or Mondays).

The latest, perhaps most convincing evidence yet for the shift to a four-day workweek comes from a six-month trial which began in February 2022 in which 33 companies with employees in six countries decreased their employees’ workload to four days, or 32 hours, a week. Organized by 4 Day Week Global, the real-world experiment sought to see whether the employees could be just as productive in 80% of the time — all for the same pay. The results were overwhelmingly positive: Companies in the program reported increased revenue and improved employee health and well-being, and had a positive impact on the environment. And after the success, a hundred more companies that together employ thousands of people are considering or are already implementing the same approach.

So if you’ve ever tried to persuade your boss to shift to a four-day workweek, this is the best evidence yet that it can work. The results of the new report were unequivocal: The four-day workweek was better for everyone.

4 Day Week Global is a nonprofit community platform that promotes the four-day workweek by helping companies implement it and by funding research into the future of work. 

There is some pushback, though. A shorter week could mean employees’ workload increases each day, causing more stress rather than less. For companies that experience significantly busier periods around holidays or during the summer, it may not be possible to extend the program across the whole year. And many companies, such as banks or insurance companies that require around-the-clock customer service or news organizations that follow a 24-hour news cycle, aren’t able to shutter for even one day each week. But in those cases, companies could approach the four-day week the way they already handle weekends: Simply arrange teams’ schedules so there are always people working.

The ongoing push for a four-day workweek isn’t the first time there’s been a movement to upend the traditional model of work. Until 1926, the standard US workweek lasted six days. Then, Henry Ford reduced the workweek at his namesake company down to five days. He believed an extra day off would increase workers’ productivity and give workers more leisure time to spend more money — hopefully on Ford cars. The trend caught on, and, after organizing by workers in favor of the shift, the Fair Labor Standards Act set the standard for the workweek at 44 hours; an amendment in 1940 set the now-standard 40-hour week. Fast forward to today, and our norms appear ripe for a shake-up once again.

While staff well-being and retention are important, the trial also was associated with a revenue boost among the participating companies. Among the 16 companies in the trial that provided revenue data, combined revenue for the companies, weighted by size, increased by 8.14%, which for some companies was nearly 40% higher than revenue growth during the same six-month period of the previous year.

Less time working correlates with lower carbon emissions — people are commuting less, and businesses use less energy.

A four-day week also provides vast improvements in well-being, life satisfaction, and sleep for women.

It’s unlikely that the world will shift to a four-day week overnight, but the trial produced real benefits and found it’s possible for many different kinds of corporations, as long as they are willing, to make the change. As companies continue to grapple with attracting and retaining staff, the four-day week could be a relatively simple solution. And after the latest trial, there aren’t many excuses not to try it out.

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AUTHOR COMMENTARY

[25] The desire of the slothful killeth him; for his hands refuse to labour. [26] He coveteth greedily all the day long: but the righteous giveth and spareth not.

Proverbs 21:25-26

Of course the WEF would want this: but they are eyeing ZERO work by 2030.

When AI and robots took over so much of our work, we suddenly had time to eat well, sleep well and spend time with other people. The concept of rush hour makes no sense anymore, since the work that we do can be done at any time. I don’t really know if I would call it work anymore. It is more like thinking-time, creation-time and development-time.

For a while, everything was turned into entertainment and people did not want to bother themselves with difficult issues. It was only at the last minute that we found out how to use all these new technologies for better purposes than just killing time.

The WEF said in an essay on life by 2030

Once 4-day work weeks become the “new normal” within the next several years or so, then Thursday will be seen as a grind and something to loathe, and then that gets axed, and then rest of the days proceeding; culminating in AI and machines taking over all the work.

Now that the WEF and the media are pushing this harder now, it will be used as a proxy to entice and coerce an already lazy and negligent worker base to start protesting their bosses and managers, to which the companies will just simply fire in bulk.

Moreover, this so-called “evidence” they are presenting just simply sounds unbelievable and more like mediocre propaganda. And the idea that Americans don’t like taking breaks, says that one woman, is just ludicrous and hysterical. Companies since 2020 are desperate for workers and are hiring literally anyone just to fill the voids.

This will not bring empowerment and freedom: just more enslavement and oppression.

The hand of the diligent shall bear rule: but the slothful shall be under tribute.

Proverbs 12:24

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[7] Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? [8] Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? [9] For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? [10] Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. (1 Corinthians 9:7-10).

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