It’s a strange debate: Although the total number of working hours is at an all-time high—and although more hours have never been worked in a single year—some politicians and many employers are currently calling for longer working hours, including in the form of overtime. For employees, this is problematic in several ways.
First, as a recent survey by the DGB’s “Gute Arbeit” Index now shows, well over half of all overtime worked in Germany goes unpaid. Companies are thus cutting costs—at the expense of employees. Moreover, overtime also exacerbates health risks. In many sectors, the workload is already very high. Overtime further extends the duration of this strain. However, it has long been scientifically proven that long—and especially excessively long—working hours are associated with serious health risks for employees.
Overtime Often Goes Unpaid
The phenomenon of overtime often going unpaid is not new: Since the early 2000s, there have been more unpaid than paid overtime hours. Overall, the number of overtime hours has tended to decline recently. However, it remains considerable. Calculations by the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) indicate approximately 1.2 billion hours of overtime for the year 2024. This means that employees in Germany worked overtime last year equivalent to more than 750,000 full-time positions. More than half of this overtime (53.6 percent) went unpaid.
In the DGB study, 57 percent of respondents now state that they do not work overtime. Twenty percent of employees work an average of more than one to five hours of overtime per week. About one-quarter (24 percent) work, on average, more than five hours per week beyond what is contractually agreed upon. Men work overtime more frequently than women. This is particularly true for those working more than five hours of overtime per week, which is done by 27 percent of men and 20 percent of women.
People work longer hours when working from home
A striking difference emerges with regard to the skill level required for the job. The higher the required qualifications, the more frequently overtime is worked. While 66 percent of respondents in unskilled and semi-skilled jobs do not work overtime, this percentage decreases with each higher skill level, dropping to 42 percent in highly complex jobs, which typically require a college degree.
The DGB study sheds light on working from home. Contrary to what one might assume, working from home is clearly linked to the prevalence of overtime. Among employees who also work from home, 52 percent work an average of more than one hour of overtime. Among employees who do not work from home at all, by contrast, the figure is 31 percent. The proportion of employees who work more than five hours of overtime per week while working from home is particularly high, at 30 percent. Among employees who do not work from home, this proportion is only 18 percent.
The greater the time pressure, the more overtime
The DGB figures clearly show that a high workload or poor work organization is directly linked to the amount of overtime worked. This can be demonstrated on several levels. For example, the more intense the work load and time pressure, the more frequently employees work a significant amount of overtime. The proportion of those working more than five hours of overtime per week rises significantly in such cases. Without a high work load, this figure is 18 percent. When work is intensified to a very high degree, that figure rises to 38 percent. Furthermore, the greater the time pressure, the more frequently overtime is worked. When employees do not feel rushed at work, 16 percent report working more than five hours of overtime per week. When work is rushed very frequently, that figure rises to 37 percent.
Finally, as the number of disruptions and interruptions at work increases, so does the amount of overtime worked. The same applies to conflicting work demands. Here, the rule is: The more employees are affected by conflicting work demands, the more frequently they exceed their contractual working hours by more than five hours per week. This proportion rises from 16 percent—when there are no conflicting demands—to 39 percent—when conflicting demands occur very frequently.
The More Overtime, the Greater the Stress
All of this has noticeable and measurable negative effects on employees. The DGB survey clearly shows that the more overtime worked, the greater the strain: satisfaction with work-life balance declines, while the number of health complaints increases.
Excessively long working hours are associated with a wide range of health problems. Exhaustion, fatigue, and sleep disorders occur more frequently, as do stress-related illnesses, cardiovascular diseases, and metabolic disorders. Furthermore, excessively long working hours increase the risk of errors and work-related accidents.
DGB figures show that around 10 percent of full-time employees work more than 48 hours per week. This means nothing less than that roughly one in ten full-time employees has working hours that pose a serious health risk due to overtime.
This is not the only area where urgent action is needed.
