Decentralisation of working hours in Denmark: a win-win situation for employers end employees?

Paper by Anna Ilsøe 

Collective bargaining on working hours has increasingly been decentralised in Denmark, leading to a large number of agreements on flexible working hours at company level. Recent case studies suggest that these agreements have improved the productivity of companies and the work-life balance for employees. However, although Denmark offers a best case scenario of organised decentralisation, certain groups of employees and companies seem less well covered by the agreements. Drawing on a comprehensive survey in the Danish industrial sector from 2008 this paper examines whether or not these trends can be confirmed with regards to company level agreements on flexitime. The paper concludes that the decentralisation on working hours in the Danish industrial sector has contributed to a broad and predominately even spread of flexitime agreements with a number of beneficial effects for both employees and companies. However, some challenges still remain with regards to those employees who are not covered by the agreements.

15th IIRA World Congress, 24-27 August 2009, Sydney