A four-day week for everyone, with only 32 hours but full pay, with an ever-increasing labor shortage and high inflation? A lot of things don’t go together.
Innsbruck (OTS) – At the latest since Corona (when the government let it be known: “No matter what it costs”), thrift seems to have been pretty much abolished in Austria. If there is a problem somewhere, Father State jumped and jumps quickly and helpfully into the breach. Up to 50 billion euros on credit to cushion the pandemic, probably just as much or even more for help with inflation.
“Yes, is it Christmas already?” Franz Beckenbauer once asked in a commercial. When it comes to working hours and pay, the opposition and trade unions in particular are actually calling for early presents. And they are demanding a four-day week for as many people as possible, working hours should be reduced to 32 hours, and without cuts in wages. Of course that would all be nice. Many would certainly like it if milk and honey flowed in some streams.
Unfortunately, reality does not take place in such a dream-land. Austria and Europe as a business location and with it our prosperity are already under pressure in terms of costs (particularly after the jump in energy and personnel costs), above all from China and the USA.
Working less, and with an already massive labor shortage: Hundreds of thousands of jobs across all areas are already hard to fill. And demographics (baby boomers retiring) threaten to double that gap. With this threatening prospect, working less also means that schools, hospitals, care, the police, trade, tourism and countless areas would have to cut their services. Or you look for tens of thousands of additional guest workers, as if that were so easy to implement and accepted. Austria is walking on dangerous paths.
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