Can Koreans really work 4 days a week?

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Wang Sung-jun, a 29-year-old researcher at the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute, worked only four days a week over the past two weeks, taking advantage of the institute’s flexible work policy.

“I worked late most days, because I still had to fulfill the 80-hour requirement over two weeks,” he told The Korea Times. “But having just four workdays definitely gave me more personal time. I felt better physically and had the freedom to do things I wanted.”

These benefits of Wang’s four-day workweek schedule may extend to more Koreans, as politicians weigh the wider adoption of a shorter workweek ahead of the upcoming snap presidential election.

On Monday, the conservative People Power Party (PPP) proposed a 4.5-day workweek, while the liberal Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) pledged to introduce a four-day work schedule.

In February, Rep. Lee Jae-myung, the leading presidential contender from the DPK, raised the issue of a four-day workweek during a speech at the National Assembly.

“Productivity gains from AI and advanced technologies must lead to reduced work hours,” he said, noting that Korea ranked fifth among OECD countries for the longest working hours.

According to 2022 statistics, Koreans annually worked 149 hours more than the OECD average of 1,752 hours per year — equivalent to more than a month of extra work.

At the time, PPP lawmakers criticized Lee’s remarks, but just two months later, it became the first conservative party to propose a similar idea.

Rep. Kwon Young-se, the PPP’s interim leader, said Monday the party will include plans to introduce a de facto 4.5-day workweek in its presidential platform.

He proposed a model in which employees work nine hours from Monday to Thursday — eight regular hours plus one extra — and four hours on Friday, calling it a “realistic alternative.”

The key difference between the two parties lies in their approach to working hours: the DPK focuses on reducing total work hours, while the PPP emphasizes flexibility within the existing legal limit, which currently caps the workweek at 52 hours.

A worker assembles parts at the factory of COAD, an automatic door company, in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province, Oct. 31, 2023. The company introduced a four-day workweek in 2022. Korea Times file

In Korea, the four-day workweek is currently seen mostly at some large companies, IT firms, public institutions and government offices. For small businesses and subcontractors, however, practical hurdles remain high.

“Shorter workweeks are a tough sell for us,” an official at the Korea Federation of Small and Medium Business told The Korea Times on Wednesday. “We’re already short on labor, and fewer working hours mean fewer production days — without reducing the actual workload. That work still needs to get done, often through overtime, which drives up labor costs.”

Concerns among large corporations were similar. “If this policy is implemented, small businesses will likely struggle to meet delivery deadlines, raising concerns about how we could sustain operations,” an official at a major conglomerate said on condition of anonymity.

Lee Jeong-hee, executive director at the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, one of the nation's two largest umbrella unions, agreed with these concerns. While large companies and the public sector may cut working hours without reducing wages, he pointed out it’s far more challenging for small and medium-sized businesses.

“We can think of a pilot program for the four-day workweek first in labor-intensive sectors with high turnover, such as hospital nurses,” he said.

Experts say that establishing systems that allow flexible working arrangements matters because each industry operates under different conditions.

“Mandating a fixed number of workdays misses the point. The question we should be asking is how to improve productivity,” Lim Woon-taek, a sociology professor at Keimyung University, told The Korea Times.

He added that the country needs regulations on excessive working hours, especially for employees who frequently work overtime.

“But in sectors like services or IT research, cutting work hours isn’t a magic silver bullet. What we need is a well-designed system of flexible working hours," he said. "The debate over shorter workweeks keeps resurfacing because we’ve relied on longer work hours to raise productivity, rather than finding smarter ways to work.”