The granting of tax incentives to companies or exempting them from certain bureaucratic obligations could be solutions to stimulate the application of the four-day week, indicates the final report of the pilot project for this type of working week.
The creation of a more favorable tax regime, to encourage this new form of work, could be achieved by reducing taxes or granting tax credits on a temporary basis or by providing direct subsidies or financial incentives to companies, suggest the coordinators of the study, released today.
In the final report of the four-day week pilot project, Pedro Gomes, professor of economics at the University of London, and Rita Fontinha, professor of strategic human resource management at the University of Reading, point out three axes – experiment, encourage, legislate – and the measures that can be taken in each one, on the way to the four-day week.
At stake is a working method in which there is a reduction in weekly working hours, without a reduction in salary and which has been applied in practice over the last few months in Portugal by 41 companies experimenting with the four-day week in Portugal (of which 21 companies are coordinating the start of the test through the pilot project in June 2023).
In terms of incentives, in addition to those already mentioned at company level, the study also suggests incentives aimed at workers, namely allowing the four-day week for parents with children under the age of one or two or for workers over the age of 50, for example.
The authors also point to incentives at sectoral level, namely the creation of tax incentives in sectors that agree to reduce working hours.
In terms of legislation, the suggestions include provisions in the labor code that regulate the four-day week in its different forms, with the authors stressing that it is “crucial that this stage precedes the formulation of tax incentives” and that some of the companies interested in the project have not moved forward due to the lack of an adequate legal framework.
Experimentation is another of the axes highlighted, with the authors stressing the need for the pilot project to be maintained or expanded in the private sector and to move towards tests in large companies and a pilot in the public sector.
“The four-day week will probably take place at various speeds and will be materialized in different formats in the various sectors,” the document points out, noting that in those where more advantages are recognized in adopting the four-day week, or more capacity to do so, “sectoral tests should be promoted”, a path in which unions should play a role in promoting the tests in collective bargaining.
