Working-week flexibility: Implications for employment and productivity

Victoria Osune
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Victoria Osuna

Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), 2014, vol. 8, No 2014-7, 29 pages

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 steady-state 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%).

Keywords: FDI; Workweek; wages; employment; productivity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E24 E60 J21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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http://dx.doi.org/10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2014-7
https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/93136/1/778428877.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Working-week flexibility: Implications for employment and productivity (2013)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:ifweej:20147

DOI: 10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2014-7

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