Case for a shorter work week

THE EDITOR: We are a unique people, with a unique culture and legacy. We are also capable of reasoning and judgement. Why do we not question the systems that we live and work by?

Circumstances change with time, and we must adapt to survive. It is as simple as that, and this self-adaptive quality is inseparable from nature itself. We have taken for granted that we must work for five days a week. Why not four days with longer hours? It is my humble opinion that both employers and employees would benefit from this greatly. For the employer: we will have 12 hour work days, meaning that in one week there would be ideally 48 hours devoted to work as opposed to 40 hours. Optimistically, more work will be done in any given week. For employee: there would be three day weekends, with more time devoted to family and leisure. Again, optimistically this works out to less stress and a more motivated and energetic employee come Monday morning.

Of course, we need to apply pragmatics. We would have to adjust the lunch hour, and introduce breaks at appropriate times during the 12 hour work day. Also, essential public services (banks, government offices etc.) Should maintain a five day work week, and develop an alternate rotation system so that their employees would not have to work every Friday. The purpose of this is to allow four-day and transact personal business. The benefit of this of course is that businesses would see a reduction in time off for personal business from their employees. This is just a common sense proposal from a common citizen making a contribution in the ‘democratic’ process. The challenge is... WHO among the power brokers has the courage to move this one step further?

JOHN O BRATHWAITE
Gulf View