Would cutting the work week put people to work?

Even though Americans are some of the most overworked people in the world - our long hours at work are doing very little to help the economy recover. So - could following the European model by cutting back on the work week actually help our economy - and put all unemployed Americans back to work? According to a recent CBO report - President Obama's 2009 stimulus package saved up to 3 million jobs - preventing an all out economic catastrophe. Unfortunately - ever since then - Republicans have blocked every single stimulus measure - radically slowing down our nation's economic recovery. Republicans are even trying to make things worse by pushing for austerity and spending cuts - which cuts jobs - and Republican governors have laid off more than 600,000 public workers around the nation. The result is persistently high unemployment, and Americans of all strips are calling for more "job creation." But here's the thing - we all have it all wrong! It's not jobs we should be talking about - it's hours on the job.

Look at the average number of hours worked by each of the OECD nations: You'll notice at the top of the list is Greece - where workers on average put in more than 2,000 hours a year on the job. That dispels that myth that the Greeks are in economic trouble because they're lazy - they actually work far more hours than the rest of Europe. But also near the top of the list is the United States - working nearly 1800 hours a year on average. Now - toward the bottom of the list - you'll notice Germany and France - places where workers put in far fewer hours on the job each year. In Germany - the average worker is on the job 20 percent fewer hours than in the United States - they work one fifth as many hours as Americans! That comes to 400 more hours of time off for a German worker every year compared to a worker here in the United States. Now - some might argue that's a bad thing. That Germany isn't working as hard as the United States - and should be suffering economically for it. But that's not the case. Germany and the United States were both hammered by the global economic downturn beginning in 2007. But where the United States saw their unemployment rate shoot up four percentage points since the recession - Germany actually saw their unemployment rate go down two percentage points. That's because Germany - and other nations that commit their workers to shorter work weeks - understand something our media won't even talk about. It's that when people work fewer hours - then companies have to hire more people.