Ending Time Poverty:
The 4-Day, 32-Hour Workweek
A national effort to make the 4-day, 32-hour workweek with full pay and benefits a credible new standard for full-time work. This project advances a practical, evidence-backed answer to burnout, caregiving strain, and outdated workplace norms by helping employers and workers adopt shorter hours without loss of pay.
Key Stats
The 4-day, 32-hour workweek is already taking hold across the United States. This project is designed to scale it.
employees targeted for 4-day, 32-hour adoption
97%
employers reached through cohorts and implementation support
28%
increase in men’s household labor reported in pilots
North American pilot continuation rate among participating employers
1,000
1 00,000
The Challenge
The modern economy changed. The workweek did not.
The 40-hour workweek was built for a different labor market and a different household structure. Today, women, caregivers, low-wage workers, and workers of color bear the sharpest burden of rigid schedules, burnout, and impossible tradeoffs between work and life.
Too often, the only “solution” offered is individualized flexibility: reduced hours, part-time work, or ad hoc accommodations that can come with stigma, lower pay, and fewer opportunities for advancement.
This project offers a structural alternative. By making shorter hours universal rather than conditional, the 4-day, 32-hour workweek gives workers more time while helping employers build healthier, more sustainable organizations.
The Project Partners
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Common Future
Lead organization providing oversight, compliance, and economic justice expertise.
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Work Time Revolution
Employer implementation partner supporting pilot design, change management, and scale.
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Boston College
Research and evaluation partner led by Dr. Juliet Schor.
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WorkFour
Movement-building, employer engagement, and worker-facing organizing partner.
Implementation Timeline
Three years to build proof, momentum, and scale.
Year 1: Build the foundation
Align the team, finalize the program model, develop evaluation tools, recruit ambassadors, and launch the first employer cohort.
Year 2: Expand and deepen
Run rolling cohorts, launch the worker training pipeline, hold regional convenings, and increase public visibility through case studies and media.
Year 3: Scale and synthesize
Expand outreach across industries, deepen research, consolidate findings, and position the model for continued adoption beyond the grant period.
Key Project Team Members
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Jennifer Njuguna
Co-CEO of Common Future
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Jessica Yupanqui Feingold
Co-CEO of Common Future
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![A woman with shoulder-length wavy brown hair, glasses, wearing gold hoop earrings, a dark green shirt with a collar, gold rings, and a red watch, sitting at a table with her arms crossed.]()
Dr. Juliet Schor
Economist and Sociologist, Boston College; Lead Researcher for Four Day Week Global trials
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![Close-up portrait of a smiling man with blue eyes, brown hair, and a beard, wearing a blue collared shirt and a dark blue sweater against a plain light background.]()
Joe O'Connor
CEO and Co-Founder of Work Time Revolution LinkedIn→
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Grace Tallon
Co-Founder of Work Time Revolution
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![A young woman with shoulder-length brown hair and blue eyes, smiling at the camera, standing outdoors in front of a red brick wall, wearing a blue short-sleeved top.]()
Daisy Morin
WorkFour Workplace Engagement Director
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![A man with glasses and a beard wearing traditional attire, including a shawl, standing indoors.]()
Vishal Reddy
Acting Executive Director of WorkFour
What this project does
A coordinated strategy to scale shorter working time in the United States
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Industry-based cohorts help organizations move from curiosity to implementation through peer learning, structured redesign, and practical support.
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Participating employers receive support on workflow redesign, performance metrics, staffing models, and sustainable reduced-hours implementation.
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The project builds worker-side demand through training pipelines, feedback channels, and partnerships with unions and worker advocates.
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Boston College will track outcomes over time, measuring worker well-being, retention, burnout, absenteeism, and long-term durability.
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Employer stories, worker stories, case studies, and public-facing materials will help normalize the 4-day, 32-hour workweek as a new standard.
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The project combines national reach with concentrated effort in focus regions to build communities of practice and generate visible momentum.
Why this matters
A win for workers, a win for employers, and a win for society
Employers in prior North American pilots reported strong continuation rates and improvements in retention, absenteeism, and organizational performance.
Workers reported gains in health, burnout reduction, work-life balance, and job satisfaction.
Women and caregivers saw especially meaningful improvements in time, stress, and work-family balance.
Because the model reduces hours without reducing pay, it addresses time poverty structurally rather than through individualized accommodations.
