“It takes seriousness to make a man,” the German novelist Theodor Fontane wrote, “but hard work to make a genius”.
Surveys indicate that Germans still regard a capacity for toil as a cardinal virtue and enjoy a reputation as Europe’s Arbeitstiere, or single-minded “workhorses”. Yet that reputation could scarcely be further from the reality of modern Germany, according to a study.
Researchers at the Roman Herzog Institute (RHI), a think tank largely funded by Bavarian industry, found that the average German can expect to work fewer hours over the course of their lifetime than the typical citizen of any other country in the European Union, with the exception of Luxembourg.
They also work fewer hours a year than anyone else in the bloc, except for the French, the Italians and the Belgians.
The issue is more than a piece of economic trivia. As the baby boomers leave the workforce, the ratio of active workers to retired people is entering a period of steep decline. At the same time the jobs market is already so tight that there are shortages in almost half of the 801 occupations tracked by the economics ministry.
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The notion of raising the state pension age, which ranges from 63 to 67 depending on birth year and social insurance contributions, remains taboo politically. However, the RHI report warns that the system is in “perilously deep trouble” and heading for a “collapse” unless Germany’s leaders grasp the nettle of reform.
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The study calculated typical working hours for the 27 EU member states, alongside Britain, the United States, Japan, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. Estonia topped the table, with the average Estonian worker putting in 1,354 hours a year and 71,331 hours over their career.
Britain came halfway down the rankings, with averages of 1,163 hours a year or 59,594 over a lifetime. For Germany, the equivalent figures were 1,036 and 52,622.
The authors suggest it partly reflects decades of strong productivity in German businesses and a culture that prizes free time, with many employees drawing a strict line between the workday and evenings and weekends. It may also be a legacy of Germany’s industrial heritage, with relatively strong trade unions and entrenched labour routines.
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The researchers said the analysis showed that much of the potential of the country’s workforce remained unused. They recommended stronger state incentives for “silver workers” to remain in the labour market after passing state retirement age and better childcare provision to allow more mothers to work full-time.
