A widely shared definition of “freedom” is tough to agree upon, but until the 1930s, a broad group of Americans, from poets and architects to business owners and conservative politicians, shared a vision that capitalism would deliver on the hazy idea in a very concrete way: more and more leisure time for all.
In their view, economic progress would carve a path from the grueling factories of the Industrial Revolution to a not-so-distant future largely free from work. As the British economist John Maynard Keynes put it in 1930, “for the first time since his creation man will be faced with his real, his permanent problem — how to use his freedom from pressing economic cares, how to occupy the leisure which science and compound interest will have won for him.”
For many decades, things seemed to be on track. New technologies helped drive up productivity, while the labor movement helped steer that growth to shift the balance of life for ordinary citizens from employment to leisure. Americans began shifting from agriculture to manufacturing jobs, where the average working week dropped from over 70 hours in 1830 to roughly 40 hours in 1930. In 1933, a bill passed the Senate — with initial support from then-President Franklin Roosevelt — that would have created a 30-hour workweek. But following significant industry opposition, Roosevelt shifted toward focusing on 40-hour workweeks for all rather than shortening them. The aim of progress followed the same shift — away from gathering more leisure time and toward securing full-time employment.
Our World in Data
Now, the lingering disruptions of the pandemic and rapid progress in AI and automation are helping to revive the dream that economic progress could lead to more leisure time. Nowhere is that clearer than in the rising interest in four-day workweeks. Results from international trials of…
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