Key facts
- Average weekly working hours in the EU are 35.9.
- Turkey has the longest average working week at 42.4 hours.
- The Netherlands has the shortest average working week at 31.9 hours.
- Part-time workers constitute nearly 43% of employment in the Netherlands.
- Stronger trade unions and collective bargaining are linked to shorter working hours.
New Eurostat figures reveal significant disparities in actual weekly working hours across Europe. The average worker in the European Union spends 35.9 hours on the job, but this figure masks substantial differences between member states and associated countries.
Turkey reports the longest average working week at 42.4 hours, followed by Bosnia and Herzegovina (40.9 hours) and Serbia (40.6 hours). These countries are the only ones where average working hours exceed 40 hours per week. Greece (39.6 hours), North Macedonia (39.5 hours), and Bulgaria (38.7 hours) also feature prominently among countries with the longest working weeks, with Balkan nations dominating this ranking.
Conversely, the Netherlands has the shortest average working week in Europe, with workers logging just 31.9 hours. This is largely attributed to a high proportion of part-time workers, nearly 43% of the total workforce, and a shorter collectively agreed working week. Germany follows with 33.9 hours, significantly less than France (35.6 hours), Spain (36.3 hours), and Italy (36.1 hours).
Experts suggest that factors such as the strength of collective bargaining, the prevalence of part-time employment, and the overall economic structure of a country are key drivers behind these variations. Professor David Spencer of the University of Leeds noted that lower productivity and a lack of worker power might explain longer hours in some countries, while the strength of unions contributes to shorter hours in others. Jorge Cabrita from Eurofound highlighted that working-time setting regimes and employment structures, including the share of part-time and self-employment, play a crucial role.