OPINION: In the 1920s, famous American businessman Henry Ford popularized the 40-hour workweek to increase productivity and spread labor across a wider range of workers. Following the popularization of Ford’s model, President Franklin D. Roosevelt passed the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) into law in 1938, officially establishing a federal minimum wage, protections against child labor and, eventually, the infamous 40-hour workweek.
For its time, Roosevelt’s FLSA served an important role in helping boost a struggling economy out of one of the worst economic crises in history. The FLSA created jobs for thousands and set up a system of fair pay for all U.S. workers. There is no doubt that without Roosevelt’s FLSA, the post-depression economy would have been tremendously worse off. However, now over 80 years later, questions are beginning to arise about whether the FLSA’s traditional 40-hour workweek is still the most beneficial structure for U.S. workers’ physical and mental health.
At the forefront of this argument is current U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has strongly pushed for the U.S. to bring its workweek down to 32 hours with pay and benefits remaining the same. In fact, Sanders has gone so far as to introduce the “Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act” to Congress, outlining a four-year plan to bring the workweek down.
“American workers are now over 400 percent more productive than they were back then,” stated Sanders in his new bill. “[Meanwhile] weekly wages for the average American worker are actually lower than they were 50 years ago after adjusting for inflation, [and] CEOs are now making nearly 400 times more than what their employees earn.”
Truthfully, Sanders’ evidence is quite compelling and shows a clear correlation that workers have been expected to be increasingly more productive, despite realizing seemingly no benefit for it.
The current 40 hour a week structure also can lead to burnout. Burnout is defined by the National Institute of Health as, “a state of emotional exhaustion, physical fatigue and cognitive weariness caused by long-term uncontrolled and unresolved work stressors.”
In 2026, the National Alliance on Mental Health released a study showing that around 53% of U.S. adults feel burned out because of their job. The only viable solution to this issue is simply working fewer hours.
This sentiment is backed by data as well. Countries such as Denmark and Norway, where the workweek is 37 hours, and Iceland, where the work week is 35 hours, typically rank the highest in terms of happiness and life satisfaction, per Our World in Data. On the other hand, the U.S. sits in the middle of the pack, despite having the largest economy in the world.
While some may argue that there will be numerous economic hurdles for businesses, such as overtime pay. I think it’s finally time that we as a country put our workers first and do what we need to, in order to protect our workforce.
