Do we need to reduce working hours in the Kingdom?

Abdullah Abdulmohsin Al-Faraj I recently read a report on working hours around the globe. If we evaluate ourselves according to this report, we find that in Saudi Arabia we still work more hours than the rest of the world. UBS Switzerland Bank issued a report saying that employees in Paris work 30.5 hours a week — this is the lowest working time in the world. Second lowest was Leon where employees work 31.22 hours a week. Moscow and Helsinki stand third and fourth with 31.4 and 31.91 hours per week. Europeans work five hours less than Saudi government officials and nine hours less than private sector employees in the Kingdom. Does that mean we need to reduce our working hours? The answer is no. Our main goal should not be to reduce working hours. We have to look at other important aspects associated with this issue, such as employees, employers and legislators. For employees, working hours are important. They are concerned with the hours they spend working in an office. Employers, be they government or private, are concerned with productivity. Legislators should find a way to reconcile what employees want and what employers are after. Frankly speaking, working in the government sector is not an appropriate yardstick because productivity in this sector across the globe is low. Therefore, we should not consider working hours in this sector as the benchmark. Working hours in the above cities cannot be regarded as a yardstick because the gross national product in these cities is low and the unemployment rate in Europe is among the highest when compared to advanced countries. The Kingdom is a developing country that is working on restructuring its economy and increasing growth in its non-oil sectors. Reducing working hours does not serve these goals. To achieve Vision 2030, we have to compare ourselves to countries that have high growth rates such as India and China where people work 42.58 and 50 hours per week. We should in the future work on reducing working hours but this should not be at the expense of productivity. In fact, we could reduce our hours and increase productivity at the same time if government agencies and private companies restructured themselves and relied more heavily on advanced technology.