In May 2025, a legislative bill introduced by a member of the Paraguayan Senate was debated, proposing the establishment of a forty-hour working week.
Its almost immediate rejection came as no surprise, given that the forty-eight‑hour working week—officially adopted in 1936 under the government of Rafael Franco—remains, to this day, largely unobserved.
The proposal was dismissed on the basis of rather trivial arguments, such as the claim that workers already enjoy a one‑hour lunch break.
In light of May 1, 2026, I feel inspired to write about this topic, thanks to an idea from a friend of mine.
I do so by drawing upon historical data and incorporating expert insights, because—despite the fact that Mr. Milei has imposed a twelve‑hour working day in Argentina—the global trend points in precisely the opposite direction.
The fight for the eight‑hour working day exacted a heavy toll in victims throughout the nineteenth century.
The martyrs of Chicago were not the only individuals to be arrested or killed during this decades‑long conflict.
The resistance offered by bourgeois governments and employers of that era was tenacious, repressive, and murderous. Yet the struggle persisted. At the Congress of the Socialist International held in Paris in 1889, it was resolved that each 1st of May would be marked by a universal strike, in pursuit of the eight‑hour objective.
In Paraguay, the first observance of this strike took place in 1906.
In 1907, France approved the eight‑hour day for the public sector, even as intense mobilisations continued, particularly in industrialised nations.
The triumph of the Russian Revolution in 1917 spread panic among bourgeois governments and capitalists alike. Revolutionary movements seeking to overthrow the capitalist system had always existed, but never before had they succeeded. Consequently, urgent concessions were deemed necessary to appease the working classes in the rest of the world.
It is therefore no coincidence that the International Labour Organization was founded two years later, in 1919, and that its first international instrument, Convention No. 1, recognised the eight‑hour working day for all member states.
The apocalyptic predictions did not materialise: enterprises were not ruined, nor were national economies shattered.
On the other hand, not every country immediately ratified that Convention.
Nevertheless, in May 1926, one of the most renowned capitalists of that period, Henry Ford, introduced an eight‑hour working day, five days per week (a forty‑hour working week) in his company, granting his workers two days off.
He believed that a longer weekend would encourage them to purchase more automobiles, and he reasoned that better‑rested workers would produce more and higher‑quality output.
This approach apparently yielded positive results for his enterprise, because in 1930 the equally famous economist John Maynard Keynes presented his celebrated paper, “Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren”, in which he predicted that one hundred years later, by 2030, individuals would need to work only three hours per day (fifteen hours per week) to meet their material needs.
Sixteen years thereafter, the ILO adopted Convention No. 47, accepting the principle of a forty‑hour working week.
That institution invariably adopts all provisions on the basis of tripartite agreement (governments, employers and workers).
This implies that there was a consensus that the new Convention would be beneficial to all parties involved. Evidence of this is that, in 1938, the forty‑hour week became law in the United States through the Fair Labour Standards Act.
Pedro Gomes, a Portuguese scholar specialising in this field who has long taught at Birkbeck, University of London, maintains that this practice has produced the following effects:
- Increased productivity per hour worked.
- Greater worker rest and reduced absenteeism.
- Lower labour turnover rates.
- Transformations in work organisation (technological improvements and adoption of good practices).
The same professor also participated in an experiment conducted in Portugal involving 41 companies, aimed at reducing the working week to four days. Of these, only four declined to implement the reduction.
Several European countries have already shortened the working week to fewer than forty hours.
In Germany, the IG Metall trade union has secured agreements for certain sectors providing for fewer than thirty hours per week. In France, the statutory working week is thirty‑five hours.
In South America, Venezuela and Ecuador have already adopted the forty‑hour week, while Chile began a forty‑two‑hour working week in April of this year, and Colombia will follow suit as of July 2026. The gradual reduction is intended to reach forty hours.
Many employers’ associations and, above all, many political leaders continue to focus on the tree while missing the forest.
They assume that when a worker stops working, the economy likewise grinds to a halt. Yet this is not the case.
The economy continues to function because that worker, enjoying a free day, may engage in leisure activities, pursue study, or seek entertainment, thereby consuming services.
Such phenomena can foster the emergence of new enterprises catering to these sectors and generate additional employment, thereby strengthening local and national economies.
According to Pedro Gomes, China adopted the forty‑hour working week in 1995 and has since become the country with the most robust domestic tourism sector in the world.
More could be said, but we shall conclude here, mindful of the length of this article.
Let it be clarified that the intention is to initiate a serious debate on an issue that is being addressed responsibly in several South American countries, whereas, in Paraguay, political mediocrity seeks to bury it beneath puerile arguments.
The author, is Paraguayan by birth, has been a trade union leader in his country, was general secretary of the Trade Union Confederation of the Americas and Deputy General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation. In September 2023 he published the book “Global South: It costs a lot to be poor”.