For the third time since the start of the year, employers, unions and the Spanish labor ministry met on Thursday, May 30, to discuss the government’s plan to reduce working hours. Currently set at 40 hours a week, it would be reduced to 38.5 hours this year and to 37.5 hours in 2025, with no reduction in pay. This is a “21st-century measure,” said labor minister Yolanda Diaz, who hails from the radical left-wing Sumar party. Rather than “living to work,” Diaz proposed having “time to walk, to study, to be with loved ones.” Ultimately, her aim is to open sector-by-sector negotiations to continue this reduction down to 35 or even 32 hours a week.
On Thursday, however, the meeting once again ended without any progress. Not only were the unions unable to reach an agreement with employers, who felt that the issue should be tackled sector by sector and negotiated within the framework of collective agreements, but the measure will still have to pass through Spain’s Congress of Deputies, where several key government allies in parliament have already expressed reservations, such as the conservative Basque Nationalist Party (PNV).
“We are going to devote all our efforts to reducing working hours, which have had their duration frozen for over 40 years,” insisted the junior labor minister, Joaquin Perez, on May 30, who hoped to finalize an agreement before the summer. Nearly 12 million private-sector workers could benefit from this measure, according to a study by the Worker’s Commissions trade union federation, particularly in industry and construction. In the public sector, on the other hand, weekly working hours are already set at 37.5 hours. In addition, many sectors have negotiated a 38-hour week as part of their collective bargaining agreements. According to Eurostat, the most frequent number of weekly working hours in Spain in 2022 was 37.7, compared with a European average of 36.6.
Low productivity problem
“As history shows, freeing up free time means increasing productivity, consumption and economic activity in general,” stressed Perez. For Lorenzo Amor, vice president of the Spanish Confederation of Employers’ Organizations, it is important to curb “the rise in absenteeism” and “increase productivity first.”
Spain has long been plagued by low productivity, mainly due to a lack of employee training and investment in technological modernization, as well as the weight of the tourism, hotel and construction sectors in GDP. According to an OECD report, Spain’s productivity in 2022, measured in terms of GDP per hour worked, was $53, compared with a Eurozone average of $61.
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