Rethink Work

Changing how we think about work

#Research

There are currently 22 articles in this category    RSS

  • faviconCultivating a Leisurely Life in a Culture of Crowded Time: Rethinking the Work/Leisure Dichotomy — many people wish to replace this paradigm with something more liberating and meaningful, a lifestyle that is not dependent on the traditional temporal schemata of obligation (2007)
    In: Democracy & Power    
    Topics: Leisure, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconThe four-day, thirty-two-hour week: analysing organisational success and failure — Based on data from 200+ global companies trialling four-day, 32-hour weeks with full pay, 90% maintained the schedule. Firms that failed to reduce stress or had more white males were likelier to revert, aligning with legitimacy theory [2025]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconNew research on work time reduction via a four-day week finds improvements in workers’ well-being [2025]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: Various    

  • faviconExtraordinary Labor Market Developments and the 2022-23 Disinflation — How remote work contributed to the unexpected economic recovery of the U.S. post-COVID, keeping unemployment low and managing inflation [2024]
    In: Democracy & Power    
    Topics: Remote Working, Research   
    Comments   
    Country: US   
    Source: National Bureau of Economic Research (US)    

  • faviconAnalysis Shows ‘Quiet Fleecing’ of US Workers—Not ‘Quiet Quitting’—Is the Real Problem. “Workers are more productive than ever, but their pay hasn’t kept pace while top 1% wages have skyrocketed,” says the Economic Policy Institute [2018]
    In: Predatory capitalism    
    Topics: Research, Wage Slavery   
    Comments   
    Country: US   
    Source: Common Dreams    

  • faviconThis Job Is (Literally) Killing Me: A Moderated-Mediated Model Linking Work Characteristics to Mortality — When job demands are greater than the control afforded by the job or the individual’s ability to deal with those demands, there is a deterioration of the individual’s mental health and, accordingly, an increased likelihood of death (PDF) [2020]
    In: Good life    
    Topics: Mental Health, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: Various    

  • faviconHow the reduction of working hours could influence health outcomes: a systematic review of published studies — findings suggest that the reduction of working hours with retained salary could be an effective workplace intervention for the improvement of employees’ well-being, especially regarding stress and sleep [2022]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Mental Health, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: BMJ    

  • faviconReduced working hours and work-life balance — Swedish study shows more positive relationship with work, colleagues, family, and clients, as well as more time allocated to friendships and romantic partners, and having access to more sources of formal and informal social support [2020]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Country: SE   
    Source: Various    

  • faviconDrastically Shorter Workweeks Needed to Fight Climate Crisis, Study Finds — Supporters of the idea linked it to calls in the U.S. and Europe for a Green New Deal that would decarbonize the economy while promoting equality and well-being [2019]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   

  • faviconThe Four-Day Week research from the Henley Business School — Too good to be true? Not according to this research. Surveying 500 businesses and 2000 employees, the report explores the benefits of working fewer days to both organisations and workers [2023]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Country: UK   
    Source: Various    

  • faviconFree days for future? Longitudinal effects of working time reductions on individual well-being and environmental behaviour — participants reported increased well-being, more intent-related pro-environmental behaviour, less car commuting, and decreased clothing expenditures [2022]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: ScienceDirect    

  • faviconAmericans Work Hundreds of Hours More a Year Than Europeans — In developing countries, workers are putting in these long hours because wages are low and they’re trying to make ends meet, the report says
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: Research   
    Comments   
    Country: US   
    Source: Various    

  • faviconWorkers want unions, but the latest data point to obstacles in their path — more than 50 years of efforts to block access to unions have taken a heavy toll on workers’ rights. Employers have been exploiting weaknesses in U.S. labor law for decades, and federal and state policy have failed to prevent this [2024]
    In: Trade unions    
    Topics: Research, Worker Rights   
    Comments   
    Country: US   
    Source: EPI    

  • faviconIndependent analysis of the South Cambridgeshire District Council’s four-day week trial shows that it was a clear success; higher employee commitment and reduced turnover, better mental & physical health and motivation, all while it continued to deliver the same quality of services [2024]
    In: Working hours    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Country: UK   
    Source: Various    

  • faviconEurope’s far-right parties are anti-worker — analysis shows that the far right voting patterns on proposed EU directives do not indicate a pro-worker stance on socioeconomic issues, let alone a leftwing one. Quite the contrary: on virtually all eight issues we examined, the far–right’s voting behaviour suggests a stance that is indifferent, if not outright hostile, to workers’ rights [2024]
    In: Democracy & Power    
    Topics: Research, Worker Rights   
    Comments   
    Source: The Guardian    

  • faviconLabor Organizing in the Age of Surveillance — Labor law’s approach to policing workplace surveillance is woefully inadequate, as new surveillance methods yield much more and much better information for employers aiming to nip workers’ concerted activity in the bud (PDF) [2018]
    In: Democracy & Power    
    Topics: Research, Technofeudalism   
    Comments   
    Country: US   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconA meta-analysis on the crossover of workplace traumatic stress symptoms between partners — Workers’ PTSD/distress from violence, harassment and abuse on the job is as harmful for their intimate partners as the traumatic stressors are for workers encountering them firsthand, shows research [2022]
    In: Good life    
    Topics: Mental Health, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconDoes less working time improve life satisfaction? Working fewer hours contributes to higher life satisfaction in Europe, and health plays an essential mediating role in this relationship, shows research [2022]
    In: Good life    
    Topics: 4 Day Week, Research   
    Comments   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconModern welfare in the United Kingdom is a universal (dis)credit to Beveridge. Adequate social security is vital to the functioning of society, as well as to the health and well-being of the population and Universal Basic Income can help by offering stable, individual, non-means tested, and unconditional money transfers, to all citizens [2024]
    In: Good life    
    Topics: Research, UBI   
    Comments   
    Country: UK   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconWealthy nations rely on a large net appropriation of labour and resources from the rest of the world through unequal exchange in international trade and global commodity chains. Southern wages are 87–95% lower than Northern wages for work of equal skill. While Southern workers contribute 90% of the labour that powers the world economy, they receive only 21% of global income [2024]
    In: Predatory capitalism    
    Topics: Research   
    Comments   
    Country: DE,  UK,  US   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconWorkers are less likely to go on strike in recent decades because they are more likely to be in debt and fear losing their jobs. Study examined cases in Japan, Korea, Sweden, the United States and the United Kingdom over the period 1970–2018 [2023]
    In: Democracy & Power    
    Topics: Research, Worker Rights   
    Comments   
    Source: Scientific Journals    

  • faviconIn a ground-breaking public attitudes study, the Fairness Foundation has unveiled striking insights into the web of factors influencing the health and well-being of people in Britain. One of the most significant revelations from the study is the pervasive impact of work on people’s health across age groups and income brackets [2023]
    In: Good life    
    Topics: Research   
    Comments   
    Country: UK   
    Source: New Statesman