--- title: Why Europeans Have Better Work-Life Balance Than You description: New research finds that Americans spend 25% more time at work than Europeans do, with the Swiss coming closest to our long workweeks. authors: - name: Martha C. White role: Writer url: https://money.com/author/martha-c-white/ education: BA, English, Princeton University at_money_since: 2015 articles: 350 covers: - Economy and Politics - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Debt - Education - Federal Reserve Rate Cuts - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology published: '2016-10-18T15:08:17.000Z' modified: '2016-10-18T15:08:17.000Z' section: Economy and Politics tags: - American workers - Careers & Workplace - Overwork - pubdesk - work hours word_count: 253 canonical: https://money.com/americans-work-more-than-europeans/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![work-time](https://img.money.com/2016/10/work-hours.jpeg) Europe's shorter workweeks and generous vacation time are the stuff of legend (and envy) among overwhelmed American workers, but even they might be surprised to find out just how much more Americans work: Recent [research](http://ftp.iza.org/dp10179.pdf) finds that Americans log nearly 25% more hours than their European counterparts. Europeans work an average of 258 hours less on a yearly basis than Americans, according to a trio of economists from Arizona State University, McMaster University in Ontario and Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany. Their methodology provides for a broader measurement of time spent at work by including things like vacation time, retirement and unemployment, so the end result is a measure of work hours per person, not just per worker. By this metric, the average American has a workweek of just over 26 hours. That doesn't sound like a lot, but compare it to our peers across the pond: In Switzerland, which is the European country with work habits most like ours, the average is around 25 hours. In the U.K., it's 22 hours. Germany clocks in at just over 20 hours, and the Italians have the shortest average workweek of all, at 18.4 hours. Economists say there are multiple reasons for the discrepancy. Lower taxes in the U.S. increase the incentive for Americans to work longer hours in pursuit of more money, one economist told [Bloomberg](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-18/americans-work-25-more-than-europeans-study-finds). Other likely factors include strong unions that protect worker time off and more generous retirement benefits, so Europeans don't have to keep working well into their senior years. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/americans-work-more-than-europeans/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Economy and Politics", "item": "https://money.com/economy-and-politics/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Economy", "item": "https://money.com/economy/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Why Europeans Have Better Work-Life Balance Than You" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/americans-work-more-than-europeans/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/americans-work-more-than-europeans/", "name": "Why Europeans Have Better Work-Life Balance Than You", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2016-10-18T15:08:17.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/americans-work-more-than-europeans/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/americans-work-more-than-europeans/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2016-10-18T15:08:17.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "Why Europeans Have Better Work-Life Balance Than You", "articleSection": "Economy and Politics", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2016/10/work-hours.jpeg", "width": 5559, "height": 3711, "caption": "work-time" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Martha C. 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