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RUDI BAKHTIAR, CNN Anchor: Now for a global look at hours of labor. It might surprise you to know that historically speaking the standard 40-hour workweek is relatively new. Until the 1700s, most laborers worked from dawn until dusk. The Industrial Revolution led to a shift from 14-hour workdays, common in Britain and the U.S., to 10-hour workdays. The movement for the eight-hour workday originated in Australia in 1856 and was soon adopted by labor forces in Britain and the U.S.
Shorter hours meant increased productivity, improved employee health, and more jobs to go around. Many countries also moved to a shorter week, including the Soviet Union, which, in 1967, reduced its workweek from six days to five.
These hours are still common practice in many countries, but a study funded by some of America’s largest businesses found that even today, many workers are pushed beyond their limits. Kitty Pilgrim has the story.

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN Correspondent: Tired of the rat race? Hey, join the club. About half the people in a recent survey felt overwhelmed by work in the past three months. People are working a lot more than a standard 40-hour week.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I work about 70 hours a week, including Saturdays.

PILGRIM: The Families and Work Institute survey of a thousand workers found 28 percent said they often felt overworked; 24 percent work 50 or more hours a week. And 22 percent work six to seven days a week.
And it gets worse: 41 percent very often use a cell phone, beeper, pager, computer or email during their nonwork hours, and a quarter don’t take all their vacation time.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sometimes you can have a vacation booked, and you know, your managers will come and say unbook it.

PILGRIM: All this because, in this economy, companies are squeezing profitability out of every worker, every minute of the working day.

ELLEN GALINSKY, Families and Work Institute: The economy has an important role in people feeling overworked. When companies are downsizing, people feel more overworked. When companies are having a harder time hiring people, people feel more overworked. Both of those things are happening now.

PILGRIM: All this generates a host of conditions that are ultimately counterproductive and hurt the bottom line.
Overworked employees make more mistakes, suffer more health-related problems, call in sick more often, and even job hop more frequently: all very costly to a business.
So the conclusion of this survey is perhaps the biggest surprise of all. This kind of pressure on employees should be discouraged. In short, the boss wants you to take some time off and relax. Kitty Pilgrim, , New York.

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