Working-Week Flexibility: Implications for Employment and Productivity

Abstract: This paper evaluates the effects for the Spanish case of allowing greater flexibility regarding the weekly hours worked on the working week, employment and productivity. A baseline model economy is calibrated to reproduce the cross-sectional distribution of workweeks across plants, as well as certain features of the Spanish economy. The author compares the steadystate status quo, where a forty-hour workweek is imposed and no flexibility is allowed, and the steady-state of economies with a higher degree of flexibility in weekly hours. The 2012 reform is found to preserve employment and generate a 1.72% increase in productivity. In the work-sharing scenario, the increase in employment (1.86%) comes at the expense of a lower increase in productivity (1.31%). Finally, the full flexibility scenario preserves employment and generates a substantial increase in productivity (2.6%).

Object Details

• Location: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
• Extent: Online-Ressource
• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Working-Week Flexibility: Implications for Employment and Productivity ; volume:8 ; number:1 ; year:2014 ; extent:30 ; Economics / Journal articles. Journal articles ; 8, Heft 1 (2014) (gesamt 30)

Contributors, Places and Time

• Creator: Osuna, Victoria

Further information

• DOI: 10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2014-7
• URN: urn:nbn:de:101:1-2412130940119.310832356959
• Rights: Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
• Last update: 15.08.2025, 7:28 AM CEST