It's Thursday evening. As you wrap up your work and head out, your thoughts might drift to a lunch date with a friend or a TV show you plan to binge. One thing you’re not thinking about is working tomorrow, because you’ve got a three-day weekend.

In fact, every weekend is a three-day weekend for you.

While this might seem like an ideal scenario to some, the standard U.S. work week has remained at 40 hours for nearly a century, despite significant increases in worker productivity.

Evidence from trial programs indicates that a shift to a 32-hour work week, with no reduction in pay, benefits workers and does not negatively impact revenues. Companies that have adopted this model often choose to continue with it.

Opponents of a reduced work week argue that most businesses would face increased costs they couldn't sustain.

California lawmakers have briefly considered legislation to allow workers to propose alternative 40-hour schedules, such as four 10-hour days, more than a dozen times since 2005. While business groups are opposed to the idea of paying the same rate for fewer working hours per week, they do support giving workers the option to suggest alternative 40-hour arrangements. Labor groups, however, oppose this approach.

Here's what you need to know about the ongoing debate and why a four-day work week may not be on the horizon for most Californians anytime soon.

The 40-hour workweek wasn't always inevitable. Economist John Maynard Keynes famously forecast in 1930 that productivity and living standards would advance so significantly that by 2030, we would only need to work 15 hours a week. Similarly, in 1956, then-Vice President Richard Nixon anticipated a four-day work week in the "not too distant future."

Neither prediction came to pass. While Keynes was correct about the rise in productivity, he was mistaken about its impact on work hours. However, this may be starting to change. Recently, advocates and researchers have been making a case for the feasibility of a shorter work week.

In Iceland, trials conducted in 2015 and 2017 tested shorter workweeks of 35 or 36 hours without a pay cut. These trials involved a wide range of workplaces, including government agencies, schools, police stations, and hospital departments, impacting over 2,500 workers. According to a report by Autonomy, a progressive think tank that advises companies on transitioning to a four-day workweek, worker well-being and work-life balance improved, and productivity was either maintained or increased in most cases.

Similarly, a recent trial in the United Kingdom showed favorable results. In 2022, over sixty companies across various sectors—such as marketing and manufacturing—experimented with reduced work hours through various methods: coordinated extra days off, staggered days off, or an annualized 32-hour week for companies with seasonal needs, all while keeping pay unchanged. A report by Autonomy, with input from researchers at the University of Cambridge and Boston College, revealed that workers experienced reduced stress and found it easier to manage work and caregiving responsibilities.

Businesses also benefited from these changes: employee turnover decreased during the trial, and revenue remained stable, rising by an average of 1.4%. By the end of the seven-month trial, 92% of the companies indicated they would continue the policy, with 18% opting to make it a permanent change.

When Buffer, a San Francisco-based social media management company, decided to implement a four-day workweek in May 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdowns, Julia Cummings, a senior customer advocate then based in New York, felt both excited and relieved. The extra day off allowed her to run errands during less crowded times at grocery stores. “We’re humans, and we have all these real-world responsibilities outside of work,” she said. “Having the space to manage those tasks felt like a huge relief.”

Buffer's CEO stated that the trial's goal was to enhance employees' well-being rather than to achieve the same productivity in fewer days. After internal surveys and data indicated that productivity remained strong, the company decided in 2021 to continue with the four-day week.

For Cummings, now living in Los Angeles, the adjustment meant coordinating staggered days off to ensure the customer support team could still respond promptly. She noted that customers didn't seem to mind the reduced schedule and felt that the change provided a competitive edge in an era when retaining and attracting workers has been challenging.

However, Buffer's experience is not representative of all cases. The managing director of Allcap, an engineering and industrial supplies company that participated in the U.K. trial, reported to the BBC that the company faced issues with overly demanding workdays and difficulties in finding coverage for the additional days off. Consequently, Allcap withdrew some of its trade sites from the trial a few months early. Similarly, Los Angeles-based market research firm Alter Agents tried a four-day workweek in 2021 but ended the experiment after finding a decline in employee satisfaction, as reported by Fast Company. The company has since shifted to offering employees an extra day off each month instead.

Despite the success of various trials, some experts remain doubtful about the feasibility of a shorter workweek on a broader scale.

Matthew Bidwell, a management professor at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, suggests that while reducing work hours could potentially boost productivity per hour, the gains may not be sufficient to compensate for the reduction in total work hours. “I doubt the productivity increases are substantial enough,” Bidwell said. “For most people and most jobs, working a four-day week might mean getting a bit less done in the long run.” He added that since compensation often reflects the value employees provide, a decrease in productivity could lead to lower pay over time. While some individuals might accept this tradeoff, it may not be appealing to everyone.

Nicholas Bloom, a Stanford economist, also criticized the trials. He noted that the participating companies were self-selected and lacked a control group, making them unrepresentative of the broader economy. “Only firms that believe a four-day week is beneficial will choose to participate in these studies,” Bloom wrote in an email.

When Assemblymember Evan Low, a Democrat from Cupertino, introduced a bill in the California Legislature last year to mandate a 32-hour workweek for large businesses without reducing pay, it faced strong opposition from business groups. The proposed bill would have required companies with more than 500 employees to adopt a 32-hour workweek and pay overtime for hours worked beyond that. Dozens of employer groups argued that the bill would impose significant costs on businesses and potentially hinder job growth in California. The bill did not advance to a vote.

Ashley Hoffman, a policy advocate with the California Chamber of Commerce, which opposed the bill, emphasized that while businesses should have the option to implement a shorter workweek if they choose, a mandated "one-size-fits-all approach" could be problematic for employers for whom such a model does not work.

There are various proposals aimed at making four-day workweeks more feasible for Californians, each with its own approach and supporters.

One idea, introduced this year by state Sen. Roger Niello, a Republican from Sacramento, allows individual employees to propose alternative 40-hour schedules, such as four 10-hour days.

Currently, workers seeking alternate schedules need a two-thirds vote from their “work unit,” which could include all employees in a department or on a shift. The proposed bill would also alter overtime pay rules. Unlike most states, where overtime starts after 40 hours per week, California also mandates overtime after eight hours in a day. If passed, this bill would enable employees to request alternate schedules and receive overtime only after working 10 hours in a day or 40 hours in a week.

Business groups, including the Chamber of Commerce, support the bill, citing the complexity of the current system and the demand for flexibility among workers. A poll by Marketplace and Edison Research found that nearly two-thirds of respondents preferred a 10-hour, four-day workweek over the traditional eight-hour, five-day schedule.

However, the bill faces challenges, as it has been proposed at least 14 times since 2005 without success. The California Labor Federation, representing various unions, opposes it, arguing that it would undermine the fundamental right to an eight-hour workday.

Another proposal, from Assemblymember Evan Low, suggests a different approach. Instead of mandating a 32-hour workweek for large companies, Low's new plan introduces a pilot program offering grants to businesses interested in testing a 32-hour schedule without cutting pay. Participating companies would need to assess the impact of the trial and report their findings to the state. “The goal,” Low explained in an email, “is to reimagine the workforce and enhance the lives of millions of Californians.”