Employee-friendly Labour Time : A Key Element to a Sustainable Pattern of Production and Consumption (Arbeitszeitwünsche, Arbeitslosigkeit und Arbeitszeitpolitik)

Whereas preferences of consumers are a cornerstone of market economies, preferences of employees e.g. regarding the preferred amount of paid labor are mostly not. However, we have found that differences between aspired and actually worked weekly hours have a serious negative impact on all three dimensions of satisfaction considered: Life satisfaction, which in turn is strongly related to many dimensions of social life; satisfaction with work, which affects productivity directly and health satisfaction, which influences morbidity and mortality as shown by studies of the WHO. This paper investigates the gap between employees preferences and realities by means of the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) data. Although restricted to Germany, our basic findings are much in accordance with European-wide research projects, especially by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions. The central analyzed question is: How many hours one would like to work, taking into account that earnings would change accordingly. A majority of German employees wanted a labor time reduction and only a small minority prefers an enlargement. By combining both effects, more than 2,4 million additional employees could have been statistically brought into work again. In addition, satisfaction would have been improved, consumerism somewhat mellowed. And, since mainly persons with children wanted to reduce their working hours, family life would have gained significantly