ChatGPT is strengthening the case for a 4-day workweek

• Economists and analysts say emerging AI technologies could make some workers more productive.
• Such a productivity boost could make a four-day workweek more possible.

If the four-day workweek becomes a reality in the US, you might have artificial-intelligence technologies like ChatGPT to thank.

Calls for implementing a four-day workweek have picked up steam over the past year as pilot programs have described promising results. One notable six-month trial that began in February 2022 and involved 33 companies found that their revenues were largely unchanged and in some cases increased.

The key to the trial's success was that employees generally were able to be more productive on the days they did work, completing the same amount of work in fewer hours.

And they managed to do so without the assistance of AI tools like ChatGPT.

Since OpenAI rolled out ChatGPT last November, workers and analysts have pointed to a variety of ways Americans might be able to use AI tools to make their working days easier and more productive. Five experts in fields including AI, economics, and politics told Insider that in the years ahead, an AI productivity boost could help pave the way for a four-day workweek.

"Any technology that increases productivity, ChatGPT included, makes a shorter workweek more feasible," Carl Benedikt Frey, an Oxford economist, told Insider.

Mark Muro, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who has researched AI's impact on the American workforce, added that "amid massive uncertainty — and fast progress on AI — it's certainly possible that AI-driven productivity could support a four-day workweek, especially in professional settings."

Oded Netzer, a Columbia Business School professor, said that AI advances could be what finally boosts labor productivity growth, which by some metrics has been sputtering since about 2005, adding that such a boost is the "necessary condition for us to work less."

In a report published on Monday, Goldman Sachs analysts estimated that nearly two-thirds of future American workers could become more productive by using AI. They said the widespread adoption of "generative AI" technologies by at least half of global businesses could boost global GDP by 7%, or roughly $7 trillion, over the subsequent decade.

'The workweek length is up for grabs'

Rep. Mark Takano, a Democrat from California, is among those advocating a four-day workweek. He recently reintroduced a bill to reduce the standard workweek to 32 hours from 40 and make employees clocking over 32 hours eligible for overtime.

"I think the workweek length is up for grabs," he told Insider.

Takano says AI's role in increasing productivity could help the US get to a four-day workweek.

"I could see in certain industries or certain segments of the workforce, that AI or technology such as ChatGPT could usher in circumstances in which shorter workweeks are the solution," he said.

The sweet spot for the 4-day workweek could be the jobs in which AI can assist and boost productivity, but not — at least in the short term — do all by itself.

"Almost every knowledge worker is creating first drafts of something, whether it's an email, a written document, code, a design," Michael Chui, a partner at the McKinsey Global Institute who has researched the impact of new technologies on businesses, told Insider. Using ChatGPT for "first drafts" — before editing them oneself — is one way Chui said the workers of the future may be able to cut down their overall workloads.

Muro said an "ideal outcome" would be that AI saves businesses "enough time to reduce hours while retaining economic returns." But he said these time savings could incentivize some businesses to shrink their workforces, leading to fewer workers working longer hours.

The US's work culture could stand in the way of a 4-day workweek

There's a lot of uncertainty about AI's effects on the workforce, however — and even if it does boost productivity, a four-day workweek isn't inevitable for all Americans.

Chui speculated that some organizations might end up expecting workers to produce even more in the same number of days.

Frey said one hurdle for the four-day-workweek movement in the US is that Americans might not actually want to work less.

He pointed to the famous economist John Maynard Keynes' prediction in 1930 that massive productivity gains would eventually lead to a 15-hour workweek. Frey said a reason this hasn't come to pass is that many people "simply prefer more income to leisure" and would prefer to work longer hours if doing that would provide a path to a higher income.

Frey argued that another thing that could stall the push for a four-day workweek is the work culture in the US, where workers generally have been found to work more and be more productive than their European counterparts, and where many people highly value hard work.

"Yes, ChatGPT might make a four-day workweek more feasible in principle," Frey said. "But there is nothing to suggest that higher productivity will translate into much shorter workweeks unless workers' preferences or institutions change."

The labor shortage and remote work could propel the 4-day workweek

Some companies that have struggled to fill open jobs — there were over 10 million in the US in January — have raised pay and offered other perks to attract workers. In the years ahead, Takano said, a four-day workweek could be another way for businesses to attract talent.

He added that something "transformational" happened during the pandemic as people experienced the flexibility that remote work provided.

The Stanford researcher Nick Bloom has found that the share of US full-time work being done from home, which peaked at roughly 60% in 2020, fell to roughly 27% in March. But Netzer argued that the "experiment" of remote work may make businesses more comfortable exploring different working models, like a four-day workweek.

"What happens if a business just drops one of the days in which it's hybrid and you don't work that day?" he said. "You're already halfway there in that sense."