The study, conducted by two research centres, the London-based Autonomy Institute and Alda, the Reykjavik-based Association for Sustainability and Democracy, provides an updated perspective on the Icelandic working time reduction programme. This intervention follows the success of a series of trials in the public sector.
Between 2015 and 2019, the Icelandic government and the Reykjavik City Council ran pilot projects that showed improvements in employee well-being and productivity. As a result, major agreements between Icelandic unions and employers have established the right to reduced working hours for hundreds of thousands of workers, according to buy phone number list the study’s authors, Guðmundur Haraldsson, Jack Kellam and Rowan Trickett. The report examined data collected by the University of Iceland’s Social Science Research Institute, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to analyse work dynamics, the working environment and the reasons why people left their jobs between 2021 and 2022.
62% of those working reduced hours said they were more satisfied with their working hours.
97% of workers believe that reduced hours have improved or maintained their work-life balance, with 52% saying they have noticed a significant improvement.
Forty-two percent of people who worked fewer hours reported less stress in their personal lives, while only six percent perceived increased stress.
“This study is a true success story: working hours have become commonplace in Iceland… and the economy is robust in many ways,” Guðmundur Haraldsson said. As CNN reported Friday, Iceland’s economy is set to grow by 5% in 2023, second only to Malta among Europe’s richest economies, according to the International Monetary Fund’s recently released World Economic Outlook. This growth rate is significantly higher than the Icelandic average, which was nearly 2% in the decade between 2006 and 2015.