WITH or without a shortened work week, the disruption brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic has caused losses in working hours across the world.

According to the latest numbers from UN agency, the International Labor Organization, the world lost an average of 12% of total working hours in the third quarter of 2021.

If the proposed study by the Public Service Department does recommend a four-day week be implemented in the public sector, Malaysia just eased herself into the ranks of developed nations – joining most of those countries in the EU, which already have a four-day work week – without working or showing the appropriate living standards.

I hope people will not be overjoyed by just reading the headlines. This does not mean they will be working less, they will simply condense their working hours into fewer days.

For example, instead of the normal working hours of 9am-6pm from Monday to Friday, it will be 8am to 7pm working from Monday to Thursday.

The justification for eagerness in rolling out this shortened week and ready acceptance by the masses is that the governments in these countries hope, with a longer weekend, people will go out and spend, thus bolster the economy.

In the EU, Iceland has just completed the world’s largest pilot project of more than 2,000 workers, proclaiming it a success.

Barely 14 years ago, Iceland’s banking system collapsed, touted as the largest experienced by any country in economic history.

The financial crisis let to the default of all three of the country’s major privately owned banks, because they could not refinance their short-term debt, leading to significant political unrest.

In France, the four-day week was far from widespread, although a law passed in 1996 allows companies to implement it.

In May 2020, the New Zealand government suggested that a four-day work week could be a way to boost tourism and rebuild the economy after the pandemic.

Spain announced that it is launching a pilot scheme similar to Iceland in 2022, while England kicks off a six-month trial in June 2022.

In Scotland, a government trial is due to start in 2023 and Wales is also considering following suit.

In Germany, the idea apparently returned in 2020 when several companies adopted a four-day week to avoid lay-offs during the pandemic.

In Sweden, a four-day working week with full pay was tested in 2015 with mixed results.

Portugal passed a law making it illegal for your boss to text you after work in ‘game changer’ remote work law.

In Asia, the Philippines has a four-day work week for all court officials and employees.

There’s also a proposed bill working its way through the legislature that would cap the work week at 35 hours for the private sector.

The Japanese government announced in 2021 of a plan to achieve a better work-life balance but nothing further was revealed publicly thereafter on how they planned to achieve this.

While some companies around the world have been operating a four-day week for some time, no country has yet made it a general practice at national level.

Are people really looking forward to the day when robots take our jobs?

Yes, around the world, the four-day week movement has been gathering steam with supporters claiming what is to be lost in trying? Humankind is not advanced by those saying it is not going to work.

Western societies have made various unsuccessful attempts to dislodge their routines but all failed to stick.

Retail and hospitality are the two dynamics they should be looking at and do they get better output?

Does the cost base change as a consequence of not having turnover, sick days, somebody not showing up etc?

Employers have to look at it in the macro because businesses currently lose huge amounts of money to staff turnover and burnout, sick days, disengaged employees, errors and duplicated work.

Studies have found, for example, that the full cost of replacing a nurse was between 30% and 130% of their salaries.

Prior to the pandemic, some employers in the private sectors offer employees memberships in clubs, yearly trips etc.

Yes, these are no longer motivating in the present times because what appeals to one worker leaves another cold.

Instead of a four-day week, employers in the private sector individualise the incentives to their employees by giving them back time.

Time is endlessly personal: a person can use it for family, for hobbies, for rest, for education. The employees can take it as and when they want it.

In a survey by Millieu Insight, a consumer and research analytic company with 6,000 employees across Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines, respondents, while favouring a compressed four-day work week, said that a 10-hour workday can also be stressful and tedious while some said it will create inequality where only select positions will enjoy the benefit.

Even the governor of Bank Negara Malaysia in a keynote address at the World Bank’s aiming high webinar series in May 2021 clearly states that while the country has come a long way, it still struggled to achieve productivity and innovation driven growth needed to become a high-income economy.

The governor also acknowledged that the country does not spend enough on research and development, leading to a deficit in the innovation capability of our economy and the returns do not commensurate with the spending on education.

The governor also said that the public sector’s ability is limited to making only incremental improvements and course corrections but not sweeping reforms.

Thus, the country needs a strong and sustained focus on protecting and promoting the qualities of efficient and effective public institutions which will define our path to becoming a high-income economy.

As she put it succinctly, ultimately, attaining high income status must commensurate with the government’s ability to intervene less but smartly. A survey by the World Bank confirmed this.

In another separate report, the World Bank states that, as Malaysia converges with high-income economies, incremental growth will depend less on factor accumulation and more on raising productivity to sustain higher potential growth.

While significant, Malaysia’s productivity growth over the past 25 years has been below that of several global and regional comparators. 

The rakyat just hope that this four-day week study was not because the government is taken in by the Malaysia Economic Monitor report by the World Bank released recently that projected the country to cross the high-income country threshold by 2025 under a baseline scenario, whereas under a low case scenario the achievement could be later in 2028.

The report states that to fully realise its human potential and fulfil the country’s aspiration of achieving the high-income and developed country status, Malaysia will need to advance further in education, health and nutrition, and social protection outcomes.

Key priority areas include enhancing the quality of schooling to improve learning outcomes, rethinking nutritional interventions to reduce childhood stunting, and providing adequate social welfare protection for household investments in human capital formation.

Or was this proposal another distraction by politicians to paint a picture to the rakyat that, despite all the negative news, the country is on track to become a high income nation in three years, come what may? – July 9, 2022.

* FLK reads The Malaysian Insight.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.