## How Much Does the World Work? ## Source details **Canonical URL:** [How Much Does the World Work?](https://www.imf.org/en/publications/fandd/issues/2026/06/how-much-does-the-world-work-amory-gethin) ## Other formats - [Markdown version](/en/publications/fandd/issues/2026/06/how-much-does-the-world-work-amory-gethin/index.md) - [Structured JSON version](/en/publications/fandd/issues/2026/06/how-much-does-the-world-work-amory-gethin/index.json) - [Bundle manifest](/en/publications/fandd/issues/2026/06/how-much-does-the-world-work-amory-gethin/bundle-manifest.json) ## Bibliographic details - Authors: AMORY GETHIN, Emmanuel Saez - Published: June 2, 2026 --- ### Main claim - Economic development does not mechanically shorten the workweek for prime-age adults; instead, social policies determine the organization of work. - The organization of work reflects a complex interplay of cultural and social choices encoded in public policies, including labor law, taxation, education, and retirement benefits. ### Data and methods (global dataset) - New global dataset covers nearly the entire world population and includes almost every labor force survey ever fielded in the world. - Main sources: household surveys fielded by statistical institutes and compiled by the International Labour Organization and the World Bank; supplemented with other international and country-specific surveys. - Coverage: 160 countries representing 97 percent of the world’s population. - Time series span more than 20 years in 86 countries. - Measurement convention: weekly hours worked in all jobs that contribute to economic production; includes unpaid agricultural work; excludes unpaid home services such as cleaning, cooking, and caring for children or elderly family members. ### Key global statistics and patterns - 59 percent of adults ages 15 and older are employed. - Those with jobs work 43 hours a week on average. - Average adult worldwide—including those without employment—works about 25 hours each week. - Working hours follow a pronounced life-cycle pattern: lowest among teenagers, rise steeply during early adulthood, peak in prime working years, and fall sharply after age 60. - Men provide roughly two-thirds of total worldwide working hours; women account for just one-third. - Disparities in total hours arise primarily from differences in employment rates rather than differences in hours among those already employed. ### Development and working hours - Hours worked per adult follow a mild bell-shaped relationship with income per capita: lowest in poor and rich countries and highest in middle-income economies. - Income levels explain only a small fraction of global variations in working hours. - Examples of variation: some of the lowest working times found in France, South Africa, and Afghanistan; some of the highest in Madagascar, Vietnam, and China. - The bell-shaped relationship is driven by hours per worker rather than employment rates. - In middle-income countries such as India and Pakistan, working time for those with jobs exceeds 45 hours a week. - Structural transformation: expansion of manufacturing and services in emerging market economies coincides with intense labor demand and long working hours; in high-income countries, stronger regulations, greater formalization, and shifting social norms gradually reduce weekly work time. - Major exceptions exist (e.g., long hours in the United States and Singapore); development expands capacity and productivity but does not mechanically dictate hours worked. ### Young and old - Working time among young and elderly populations declines sharply as countries develop, driven primarily by institutional change rather than rising wealth alone. - For young people: expanding school attendance reduces work hours as adolescents shift from working to studying. - For older adults: development of public pension systems allows retirement without severe income loss, reducing working time. - Once schooling and pension coverage are accounted for, national income no longer predicts working hours for young and elderly groups. ### Gender reshuffling among prime-age adults (ages 20–59) - Total prime-age working time has been remarkably stable across development levels and over long historical periods. - United States example: average prime-age hours, including those without jobs, were about 30 a week in 1900—virtually identical to today. - Stability observed across western Europe, Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and many parts of Asia, with the Great Depression as a notable exception (sharp drop). - Underlying this stability is a reorganization by gender: - Male working hours decline with development (decline in hours on the job). - Female hours in paying jobs increase with development (rising employment rates as barriers fall). - In many regions, these forces offset each other, leaving total prime-age labor stable while reducing gender inequalities in working time. ### Taxes, regulations, and institutional drivers - Many high-development countries show reduced working hours linked to the development of welfare states and labor market institutions. - Cross-country correlation: higher labor taxes correlate with fewer working hours; low-tax countries such as India tend to record longer hours, high-tax countries such as France work considerably less. - Conditional analysis: after accounting for labor regulations and expansion of formal employment, the direct effect of taxes on working hours disappears. - Stronger regulation of working time and broader coverage of formal labor contracts appear to be the primary drivers of reduced hours at high levels of development. - Policy levers shaping hours worked include limits on maximum working hours, overtime rules, paid leave, and retirement systems. ### Policy implications and interpretation - Reduced hours reflect policy choices about how work should be organized, not simply individual responses to incentives. - The balance between work and leisure is a collective negotiation embedded in institutions, labor laws, and social expectations. - Policymakers should view working-time patterns as outcomes of public policy decisions (education, pensions, labor regulation, taxation, formalization), not as automatic consequences of rising income. *AMORY GETHIN and EMMANUEL SAEZ, F&D Magazine, June 2026.* --- ## Content in this bundle - **How Much Does the World Work?** - [How Much Does the World Work? 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