🔗 Share this article

Government Building

The Greek legislature has given the green light a contentious labor reform that authorizes 13-hour work shifts, despite widespread resistance and countrywide protests.

The administration claimed the measure will modernize the country's work laws, but critics from the left-wing party described it as a "regulatory disaster."

Main Elements of the Recently Passed Work Legislation

Under the newly enacted legislation, yearly extra hours is capped at one hundred and fifty hours, while the standard forty-hour workweek stays unchanged.

The government maintains that the longer workday is optional, only applies to the business sector, and can only be used for up to thirty-seven days each year.

Political Backing and Opposition

The recent vote was supported by lawmakers from the governing centre-right political group, with the moderate party – currently the main opposition – rejecting the legislation, while the progressive party did not vote.

Labor unions have organized multiple protests demanding the bill's withdrawal recently that brought transportation and services to a stop.

Government Justification and Worker Safeguards

A senior official supported the bill, saying the changes align Greek legislation with modern labor-market realities, and accused critics of misleading the citizens.

These regulations will give workers the option to accept extra work with the current company for increased pay, while guaranteeing they will not be dismissed for declining extra hours.

The measure follows EU working-time rules, which cap the mean week to forty-eight hours counting extra hours but allow flexibility over a year, according to the government.

Opposition Perspectives and Union Responses

However, opposition parties have charged the government of weakening workers' rights and "driving the nation back to a medieval work era." They say Greek workers currently work longer hours than the majority of EU citizens while receiving lower pay and still "struggle to make ends meet."

The public-sector union said flexible working hours in reality mean "the end of the eight-hour day, the destruction of personal time and the authorization of over-exploitation."

Recent Labor Changes and Economic Background

In 2024, the country enacted a six-day work schedule for certain sectors in a bid to boost the economy.

New laws, which came into effect at the beginning of July, allow employees to work up to forty-eight hours in a workweek as opposed to 40.

European Work Statistics and National Economic Metrics

• Across the European Union in the previous year, the highest average hours were observed in Greece (39.8 hours), then Bulgaria, Poland (38.9) and Romania (38.8).
• The lowest work hours in the bloc is in the Netherlands (32.1), as per Eurostat.
• Starting January 2025, the nation's national minimum wage was nine hundred sixty-eight euros a month, ranking it in the lower tier among EU countries.
• Joblessness, which had reached a high at twenty-eight percent during the financial crisis, was 8.1% in August versus an EU average of five point nine percent, figures from the statistical office show.
• Greece is recovering since its prolonged debt crisis, which ended in recent years, but wages and quality of life remain among the poorest in the EU.