ShutterstockAs we all settle back into work after the August bank holiday weekend, many of us are wishing we could have three days off at the end of every week, if only to have the extra day to recover from the hangover!
Well, it turns out that it actually should be like that. This is according to David Spencer, Professor of Economics and Political Economy at the University of Leeds, anyway, who reckons time off should even be pushed as far as a four-day weekend. Yes please!
You see, those extra days off could actually help reduce the risk of having a stroke, coronary heart disease and developing type 2 diabetes, as well as improving mental well-being.
However, for many, the idea simply isn’t feasible. After all, working fewer hours for just three days per week would mean the economy could take a pretty significant hit.
WavelightmediaSome people even subscribe to the notion that working makes you healthier and happier, but Spencer argues that time off is the real solution to a better life.
Writing in ‘The Conversation’, he said:
It is a mark of how we have come to accept work and its dominant influence in our lives that we do not grasp this idea more readily. By working most of the time, we also lose time with family and friends. And more than this we lose the ability to be and do things that make life valuable and worth living.
See [the Bank Holiday weekend] as a reminder of a life that could be – a life that we should seek to achieve, by resolving to overcome the barriers, economic as well as ideological and political, to working less.
ShutterstockWe’re not sure if the UK government would ever subscribe to such a notion, to be honest. Even so, do you reckon we can get a petition going to try and make this a reality?
