The goal of this essay is to critically examine the topic of work day reduction, expounding some of the important theoretical and empirical dimensions that are often excluded from public debate on the matter. Analyzing some of the characteristics of workers' contracts within the Brazilian labor market, we demonstrate that there is considerable distance between discourse and academic readings of the issue and its reality. The reduction of the work day is a multi-faceted theme that characterizes a complex and polysemic debate, stirring the interest of a variety of social agents who are interested in the matter but whom maintain different conceptions of it, given the heterogeneity of the values that are at stake. We argue that the social implications of a political measure reducing the work day cannot be predicted. Nonetheless, such a reduction is a historic tendency, linked to socio-economic development. There are marked differences between trade union discourse, political sympathies, theoretical assertions and empirical evidence on the matter This essay looks at two main dimensions of the topic: quality and quantity of employment. When examined from the quantitative side, the issue of job creation comes to the fore, in the interests of minimizing the effects of unemployment. When the focus turns to the qualitative side, what is at stake is the issue of the relationship of work activities to wealth and outputs, of providing real improvements in work conditions and worker's quality of life.
Work Day Reduction; Employment; Job Quality
