Productivity and Keynes’s 15-hour work week prediction for 2030
an alternative, macroeconomic analysis for the United States
Additional information
Authors
Beretta E.,
Bariviera A. F.,
Desogus M.,
Stettler C.,
ROSSI S.
Type
Journal Article
Year
2024
Language
English
Abstract
This paper analyses Keynes’s 1930 prediction that technical advances would cut people’s working week to 15 h by 2030 and investigates why actual working hours are significantly higher in the United States. Elaborating on Keynes’s forecast to provide a general productivity formula while keeping its simplicity, we ran tests on macro-data from 1929 to 2019 and on estimates for 2030, demonstrating that productivity is surprisingly still insufficient to allow for a reduction in working hours across the US economy. This finding represents a substantial contribution to the literature, which has mostly explained long working hours by means of new consumer needs. Even by using microdata, we show that consumption does not explain the stickiness of working hours to the bottom. Hence, this paper combines a macroeconomic, logical-analytical approach based on historical time series with rigorously constructed time series at the microeconomic level. Finally, we also provide policies to narrow the productivity differential to Keynes’s prediction for 2030 while fostering work-life balance and sustainable growth. To understand long working hours in the US despite technical advances—this being one of our main findings—productivity remains crucial.
Keywords
John Maynard Keynes, Productivity, Working hours
Journal
Journal of risk and financial management
Volume
17
Number ( Month )
7
Pages (or article number)
306
Diffusion
License
CC BY
Visibility
Public
Status open access
Gold
