Given the chance, would you consider working a little less?

Gee... would you be willing to return to economy and the tax rates of the 1950's and 1960's even if our much loved and coddled Billionaires weren't able to inherit quite as many Billions?
Our society has seen an explosion in productivity in the past 60 years yet for the past 30+ the spoils of those gains have gone to an extremely small group of people & the Corporations they own.
Why is the economy collapsing and why are so many Canadians holding temporary jobs while our countries wealth is being shipped over seas? Because Canadians (and Americans) have become spineless and tolerate corrupt and incompetent leaders.
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What do our 'financial' authors recommend? Pouring your fiat currency savings into a currency that is rapidly being debased. Remember gasoline was $0.44/litre in 1989 and is well over $1.20/Litre now, have your wages matched pace? At this rate you'll be lucky to be able to buy a years worth of gasoline from your life savings when you retire (all in a country that is virtually at the top in crude oil reserves). It would be ironic if it wasn't so pathetic.

The numbers aren't a fair deal. For many careers, working 20% less hours does necessarily result in a 20% drop in productivity or accomplishment. It certainly would for some jobs where the worker does many small tasks such as a line cook, waitress, delivery driver, data entry, call center worker, etc. However, for a more future-focused and project based job such as engineer, scientist, marketer, manager, lawyer, etc... working 4 out of 5 days would likely result in a significantly smaller productivity decrease than 20%. So the wage decrease of 20% would be an unreasonable deal to those employees.

This idea would only work for the wealthy/well paid, since they can afford to take off an extra day. Duh.

Well, there it is, a more balance lifestyle at what expense, costs keep escalating for the essentials in life and the salaries do NOT. My personal career experience has proven a 4 day work week does promote more enthused, productive employees and also frees up the time of income earners to spend their money (if they have any disposable income) on their days off to feed the struggling economy/billionaires. The future success for any company is looking at the BIG picture - happier employees work harder and are more reliable, so clue in and consider a little give and take. If a company can afford it don't offer the pay cut or minimize the % (or make it voluntary) and watch what happens because we all know what greed gets us and frankly it's not working at any level - it never has.

I would GLADLY work less hours for less pay. Less work hours should be the inevitable consequence of higher productivity, rather than more people unemployed. The reality is that real wages over the last 50 years or more have increased greatly. It seems most people would rather put those increases to a bigger house, filled with more junk they don't need, than turn it into more free time. If that weren't so, more people would negotiate more time off with unions rather than more money. Every time there are contract negotiations, it's always about more money than time off. A small minority of people, like myself, actually have a life and would enjoy more free time. Life's too short, and in this day in age a 40 hour work week should be a thing of the distant past.

Would be nice, too bad my 44hrs and my wife's 40hrs leave us with about $400 monthly to spend on clothes or other miscellaneous expenses such as bars, restaurants, travelling (yeah right), and that goes in an instant. I live in the GTA, according to recent stats I make dead on average annual income and my wife is close to it. I can imagine that out of those statistics many more people are below the average with a few high earners raising the number to what it is. I don't know how the majority live normal lives in this area, I've just about had enough with an average income and am looking to get out, I imagine that many people actually work 50 or more hours to pay the bills.

Not so relevant to the article I suppose, but if I had the opportunity to make exactly what I make and take a friday off I'd do it. I think many who could do it but don't are too ambitious to stop working, they wouldn't be making the money that allows them this kind of flexibility in the first place if they weren't. Some of those above me in my company though just seem like willing slaves, they do make the money to take time off but they actually spend more time at work than most of us are willing to.

I think the issue is the taxes that most people pay as minimum wage goes but also bring people to a higher bracket. Best suggestion is have a major reform in everything as no one barely scraping by could survive on less than what they are living on. I think in Canada we should introduce an estate tax and cut governemnt salary as there is to many officials doing nothing really to help the needy. Get

Cutting back a day is just not an option. Why, who can afford it anyway? My salary hs been frozen for the past 4 years and they just renewed it for another two a few months ago. The reality is that the Government is not looking after the people who vote them in. The answer is to vote them out, but to pick who? They are all the same. My wife had the nerve to get pregnant at her job and they let her go to avoid paying maternity. There are laws against that? Yeah right see a lawyer and you'll find out that there are not.
So our household income has dropped by $30,000 per year and I am on a pay freeze program or who knows how long. Someone has to hold coporations accountable for their actions. Right now they cut, cut, cut and for what? Because they olny made 300 million this year versus 290 million the year before and they predicted 350 million. So a whack of people lose their jobs so that executives can earn larger bonuses and for what? Killing society.

I am sure we would all work less if we can afford it. Think about it, everyone works because you have to pay off debt. Once your debt is gone and you can save some money, your retire.

Well, some of us will get there one day! The rest, well have fun working for the man!

I decided, I would cut my salary to gain a life. I realise that it was an hard, yet essential decision in order to staying alive. I worked a lot. I chose quality living. It saved my life. I never go back. More money means more problems. Education is important, eh?