30-hour Work Week is Possible and Necessary

30 HOUR WORK WEEK IS POSSIBLE AND NECESSARY

Full Employment Only Through Reduced Working Hours

By Heinz J. Bontrup and others

[This open letter to unions, parties, social and environmental organizations and church leaders in Germany is translated from the German on the Internet, www.ossietzky.net.]

We the undersigned of this open letter turn to representatives of the unions, all democratic parties, spokespersons of social and environmental organizations and church leaders in Germany with an urgent appeal to give the highest economic, political, social and humanitarian priority to the struggle against mass unemployment. Germany and the whole European Union are in a serious economic and social crisis. Unemployment in Europe has reached unbearable levels. Youth unemployment is over 50% in individual countries. While the number of jobs in Germany increased in the last years, these are mainly short-term jobs that are not enough as a foundation of life (so-called precarious jobs). Overcoming the labor market crisis requires the active involvement of all democratic forces in the country. Economic power and neoliberal policy must be prevented from burdening the wage-earning population, the unemployed and the socially weak with the costs of the crisis. A fair distribution of labor through a collective reduction of working hours is necessary. Let us fight together for that reduction!

A socially and economically counter-productive redistribution from labor- to asset income (profit, interests, rents, leases) has occurred for years. The domestic demand was restricted and the surplus capital was redirected into the financial sector – away from the producing real economy. Enormous financial speculation and financial crises were the consequences. Overcoming crises cannot be left to drawing high profits from crises and only increasing the assets of the wealthy at the expense of the great majority of the population with pseudo-alternatives and a therapy for symptoms. Nearly forty years of neoliberal capitalism are enough.

This wrong political-economic track has led to indescribable social misery all over the world and not only in Germany and Europe. An economic policy that blindly hopes for further growth aggravates the dangers of climate change and destruction of nature. It deepens the divisions within and between societies. The rich become richer and the poor are made poorer.

The neoliberal redistribution would not have been possible without long-lasting mass unemployment – neither in Germany nor in any other country. An oversupply on the

labor markets leads to lower wages. Therefore, the profiteers and their political supporters strive with all their might to divert from the fact of current mass unemployment. In Germany, neoliberals vigorously repeat their propaganda that there is nearly full employment in Germany. This borders on cynicism given the reality of mass unemployment. The sector-specific shortage of skilled workers that is artificially played up can be quickly removed by higher pay and by better continued training in the longterm. The claim of neoliberals that we must work longer because of the demographic change and safeguarding pensions also has no empirical basis.

In Germany, six million persons are unemployed or under-employed if we include those marginally employed and not voluntarily working part-time. Workers in the factories must accept extra work or overtime while many persons suffer under the psychological consequences of unemployment in depressions, inferiority complexes etc. As several academic studies document, stress, burnout, psychosomatic and chronic illnesses dramatically increase. This state is unworthy of a modern society in the 21st century. Under conditions of mass unemployment, the dominant neoliberal model has robbed the unions of much of their creative power and driven them to the defensive. Workers worry about losing their jobs. The conduct of employees and unemployed bordering on submissiveness is promoted. The readiness for considerable concessions (lower wages, longer working hours, greater work concentration, more flexibility etc) and the further weakening of unions – not only in their wage negotiations – originate here…

Mass unemployment is the cause of a ruinous competition among workers and promotes the genesis of the low-wage sector and discriminating work forms like subcontracted work and work contracts without union representation. Therefore, a reduction of work to the 30-hour week is pressing. While the average working hours in Germany is presently 30 hours a week, the work is unequally distributed. The demand for the 30-hour week includes all conceivable work forms (even extended vacations or an early exit from gainful life or sabbaticals etc). All European Union states must face this demand. Mass unemployment dramatically increases in many EU states.

Reducing working hours is an overarching social project. A fair distribution of work considers the interests of both employees and the unemployed. It is also an important step to equality and a sensible family policy measure – since it makes possible a futurefriendly arrangement between family and occupation. The end of mass unemployment can only happen with broad support from politics, social- and environmental organizations, churches and all civil society.

We know about the difficult conditions in factories where workers resisted extended working hours after the struggle for a 35-hour week came to a standstill. We know many cases where employees had negative experiences since past reduced working hours were often paid with increasing work pressure and without hiring the unemployed…

Only a collective reduction of working hours to a 30-hour week is the crucial key for the perspective of a full employment – if not the most important. We are ready to actively support and accompany a social campaign.

30-hour Work Week is Possible and Necessary

30 HOUR WORK WEEK IS POSSIBLE AND NECESSARY

Full Employment Only Through Reduced Working Hours

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