Hardest working countries?
- Thread starter monty21
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Quote from makloda:
Labor productivity (output per working hour) is high in (former) West Germany -- doesn't mean the Germans put in the longest hours though.
I think Germany once held (maybe still does) the record for having the most paid public holidays per year. Plus each worker gets around 15-25 days of paid vacation days per year on top of that, making them one of one of the lazier countries world wide if you look at avg. working hours per year. They could afford this luxury over the recent decades, considering they were the world's largest exporters and one of the winners in the globalization game.
Productivity took a huge hit post 1990 (reunification with former communist Eastern German Republic) as democratic Germany grew by 20 million relatively unproductive capita. After trillions in transfer payments from the West and 20 years later, I believe there is still a gigantic productivity gap between the industrious southern regions like Swabians (Stuttgart) and Bavarians (Munich) and their Eastern brethren (Berlin, Leipzig etc.). IIRC the Czech Republic (without trillions in transfers) has a higher average industrial output per capita than Eastern Germany today
Great post...
I think the Germans are one of the most productive countries in the last century.
They recovered after WWI awfully quickly although their leaders shifted that energy in the wrong direction.
Quote from dhpar:
Norway, Sweden and Denmark are ahead of us? Aren't they the dreaded SOCIALISTS! Maybe if we go SOCIALIST we'll work harder too.
you will have to......
Why knock the countries that consistently have the highest standards of living, highest ratings for literacy, great health, lowest scores for corruption, few citizens below poverty levels, etc?
Just like there is no way right or wrong way to trade, some economic/political systems work in certain situations. Socialism and the welfare state works in Scandinavian countries. Let them be, it doesn't mean that it will work in America, but it looks like that system works for them... nothing dreaded about it.
A lot of middle-east nations also won the oil lottery and they do not distribute the wealth...look at their citizens.
Russia won the oil lottery and there is a huge gap between the rich and poor.
Just because Norway has oil, their economic/political system ensured that all their citizens benefited.
I lived and worked in Canada for 8 yrs. Canadians worked harder? It must be a joke.
You need to stop using yourself as a source. For example, these two items
Report: U.S. Workers Are Most Productive: "Only part of the U.S. productivity growth, which has outpaced that of many other developed economies, can be explained by the longer hours Americans are putting in, the ILO said. The U.S., according to the report, also beats all 27 nations in the European Union, Japan and Switzerland in the amount of wealth created per hour of work -- a second key measure of productivity." -- AP
The productivity of Japanese workers in key export sectors like automobiles is legendary. But what is less well-known is that Japanese productivity is uneven. Japan's great export industries are world leaders, but manufacturing sectors that produce for its de facto closed domestic market are surprisingly inefficient; many estimates put Japan's total productivity -- even in manufacturing -- at 10 to 20 percent below that of the United States. Where Japan really underperforms, however, is in services. Government regulations that limit competition have sustained an old-fashioned service sector. Because of low service productivity, total output per worker in Japan is only about 70 percent of the level in America.
you gotta be kidding me. Seriously, I claim you know really nothing about Japan at all. The service industy in Japan is possibly the most efficient in the world, I also pointed that out in an earlier post and explained why. You need to differentiate between the private sector and government entities. I dont have comments to spare about politics but the private service sector is so extremely efficient that American businesses do not even enter this market (for most part), knowing they have zero chance in competing even in industries that are completely unregulated. There are some execeptions and even those show the competitiveness and efficiency of the Japanese service sector: McDonals is hugely successful in Japan but McDonals is used here in Japan for a completely different purpose than anyplace else and American management understood to keep their hands off any managerial decisions within the Japanese unit. It is completely independently managed and as far as I heard management here in Japan has complete discretion over their decisions. Another example is 7-11 convenience stores. They were run so successfully here in Japan that the Japanese part in the end bought out the American unit. There are countless examples but believe me dealing with anything that is related to service in Japan is an absolute blessing. Contrary to that tell me how you feel when you pick up a phone in Germany or the U.S. to complain about some problems in your utility bill or you want to change a service plan or cancel something. Or maybe you can comment on the attitude of the clerk when you enter a fast food joint or restaurant in your country. Or what about when you enter department stores, do you get attacked by 3-4 sales people who try to push you to make a purchase decisision asap. Sound familiar? Or what about train stations and other public commutes, have you seen anything handled as efficiently as in Japan? Or what about mail, can you send a freshly caught salmon across the country and it gets delivered on the same day packed in ice, handled with the utmost care without shelling out a fortune (by the way all standard domestic mail gets delivered on the next business day, no matter how remote the region)? But maybe you can share some of your examples where the Japanese service sector is inefficient. I agree wholehardedly when you claim the individual worker may be inefficient (the ones who are not client facing) but that I all mentioned in an earlier post. I would love to hear from people who really do have Japan experience, maybe some disagree, I am totally open to differing opinions. By the way, I think the financial service sector in Japan is increadibly inefficient, ranging from simple ATM transactions to e-banking and financial advice and product diversity, so yes not all is rosy in the land of the rising sun ;-)
Quote from shortie:
Forbes is such a rag but it is good for some laughs. Where did the get their methodology for this study? "Let's use whatever methodology we could come up with as long as US ends up in the top 10 hardest working countries" - something like that?
That's funny...
I do think American workers technically work the most hours per week (avg). But that may only be true because the Chinese don't have a system to clock their workers yet.