Culture Matters
Four Days A Week: What the global trials reveal with Juliet Schor
Juliet Schor is an economist, sociologist, and Professor of Sociology at Boston College. Over a career spanning more than four decades, she has studied working time, consumer culture, sustainability, and the changing nature of work. She is the author of several influential books, including Four Days a Week . As a lead researcher on global four-day-week trials involving hundreds of companies across 15 countries, Juliet has helped build one of the most significant bodies of evidence on shorter working hours. In this episode, Juliet joins Subbu to explore what happened when organizations moved from a 40-hour, five-day week to a 32-hour, four-day week—with no reduction in pay—and what the findings reveal about productivity, burnout, wellbeing, and the future of work. We explore: Juliet’s journey from labour economics to studying consumption, sustainability, and the four-day week Why the pandemic became the inflection point that encouraged employers to experiment with shorter working hours What the history of work teaches us—and why industrialization initially lengthened rather than shortened the working day Why technological progress alone does not determine whether people work fewer hours How employer preferences and the “elastic hours” of salaried employees contribute to overwork Why a four-day week is not about squeezing five days of work into four, but about redesigning meetings, workflows, and distractions What the global trials revealed about burnout, mental and physical health, sleep, anxiety, work–life balance, and productivity Why nearly 70% of participating employees reported lower burnout—and why better-rested employees often produced better-quality work What employees actually did with their additional day off—and why they generally did not use it to take on second jobs Why only around 10% of participating organizations reverted—and what leadership changes, staffing constraints, and implementation choices teach us about failure How AI could help organizations sustain a four-day week—or, depending on the choices employers make, lead to even longer working hours Why Juliet remains optimistic that the four-day week is moving from an experiment towards a broader global movement
