WP 1 - The first part-time economy in the world. Does it work?

The First Part-TIME Economy in the World
Does it Work?

agreement, the normal (legally defined) length of the maximum working day, the definition
of normal daily hours, and so on, may be stretched further than the standard rule up to a
legally defined limit on maximum working hours.

According to the 1997 labour force sample survey, excluding very small jobs of less than 12
hours per week, around 43.3 of all employees work irregular hours (alternating evening and
night hours, including shift work: 14.4%; evening hours: 14.2%; weekend hours: 15.1%).
Around ten per cent of all workers regularly work overtime. Comparison with data of some
years ago do not suggest a very strong increase, except for evening hours (due to increased
operating hours and increased business in retailing and hotels and restaurants.). A slightly
higher proportion of women than men is involved in irregular working patterns, in particular
outside industry (until recent women were not allowed to work in night shifts except in
nursing). With the exception of those who work only evening hours, there is no strong
correlation between irregular working patterns and part-time work, or between irregular
hours and type of employment contracts. Young people work significantly more often
irregular hours than older workers.

4.5  Part-TIME employment

Already by 1988 there were 1,886,000 part-time employed people (31.4% of all people in
employment). In 1997 their number had risen to 2,656,000 part-time jobs (36.9%). This is
an increase of 40.8 per cent in nine years, four times the increase (10.3%) of full-time
employment (see Table 3). The strongest contribution comes from women working half-
time or more (69.1%), but even among men this is the fastest growing category of
employment (27.4%). We learn further from Table 3 that one out of two part-time jobs is
half-time or more. In recent years part-time jobs tend to become longer. This reflects the
well-documented preference of women who currently work in small part-time jobs (less
than half-time) for more hours (and earnings). It also appears to reflect the preference of
employers to expand in an increasingly tight labour market the part-time jobs of workers
who are already employed rather than going to the trouble of hiring new (part-time)
workers. The tendency to ‘add more hours’ to part-time jobs (mainly of women) has been
reinforced through the pressure to reduce working hours of full-time working men during
the 1994-97 working time campaign. This may explain why in the past three years the
number of employees working between 20 and 35 hours increased twice as fast as total
employment.

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