Should Hong Kong Implement Standard Working Hours?

           If you ask me what Hong Kong spirit is, “Hard-working” must definitely come to my mind in 3 seconds. Because Hong Kong people is famous for their determination and persistence, these help transform Hong Kong from a small fishing village into an international financial and service centre. However, according to a recent survey conducted by the Chinese University of Hong Kong, 40% of respondents working for 70 hours or above per week[1], which is significantly higher than the 40-hour working week suggested by the International Labour Organization (ILO, 1962), so there is a heated debate over the legislation on standard working hours in Hong Kong. In my opinion, it should brook no delays in carrying out this policy.

          Overtime work raises a concern that it may threaten the health of employees, so setting up this policy can ensure the health of workers physically and mentally.  From “European Heart Journal”, it quoted a study[2] that the risk for having heart attack or other heart-related problems will be increased by 60% if you work 10 hours per day. Overtime work but without enough exercising may lead to poorer immune system. Headache, indigestion and high blood pressure are the main symptoms (Zhang, 2007). Last year, a taxi driver was killed at the end of his night shift when his car fell 18 metres from a flyover in Ngau Tau Kok. The police suspect there may be overfatigue or illness causing the accident. Night shift taxi drivers always need to work for 12 hours continuously, so they have poor concentration in the next morning and easily lead to car crash. Moreover, overtime work may cause anxiety, depression and insomnia as well. Therefore, with standard working hours, workers can be healthier to have higher productivity and avoid industrial accidents.

          Also, workers can enjoy more private time after the implementation of standard working hours. Being with families is the fundamental of happiness. Estranged relationship may occur due to lack of communication. Reading an article called “All Worked Up” (Lin, 2013) in Time Out, Chi-keung Lee, a chef at a Chinese restaurant in Tsuen Wan, describing his life as “wake up, go to work, finish work, go home, eat a bit, sleep and then repeat the same cycle the next day”. When he gets home, his son has gone to bed already. Overtime work makes him don’t have much time being with his family. A survey conducted on June in Hong Kong discovered that more than 40% of food industry workers who were interviewed spend less than 15 minutes with their children every day due to employment commitment. When they have holiday, they will choose taking rest rather than having recreation with their friends or families. Therefore, carrying out standard working hours provides cornerstones for workers to mend their relationships in their social circles.

          Moreover, when the standard working hour is set, it may create job opportunities. There are people who are willing and able to work but they are unemployed, but at the same time, there are employees who work for long hours under tired situation. Therefore, assume that the companies do not want to apply overtime pay to the existing staff, they need to hire more workers to do the work in order to compensate the time shifting between staff. As a result, the unemployment rate would be lower since job opportunities are provided due to the legislation on standard working hours.   

          Apparently, the business sector has the strongest opposition towards this issue because regulating working hours may not be applicable to different industries due to the nature of the carrier, such as teachers, doctors and merchants. Also, they refute that it may increase the production cost and earn less profit for their enterprises. 

          The most obvious disadvantage that the business sector raised is proposing standard working hours will retard the economic growth in Hong Kong. According to a study conducted by the Labour Department, if the standard working hours per week is 40 hours, the estimated number of employees will be affected is 238000, it occupied 91.9% of full-time employed workers (Bauhinia Foundation Research Centre, 2013). Lower wages and profits will be received by the workers and enterprises respectively. Ostensibly, working fewer hours will earn less money, but with shorter working time, employees can be more concentrated on their own works with fewer mistakes and errors, so their working performance are better. Therefore, the companies can earn a higher revenue by using the least time to make the most money, more bonus can be distributed. As a result, the economic growth will not be slowing down.

          Second, the enterprises are worried about the increase in production cost. Because companies need to employ more people, and sometimes even using expensive machines to replace labour in order to fulfil the standard working hours. Moreover, workers have to receive overtime rate when they need to work longer hours, which must be more than the regular rate. It will put pressure on companies’ financial status. However, it will only happen in the short run since companies will find ways to rearrange work flow in a more efficient manner in the long run (Siu, 2013). Workers will have stronger motivation to finish their works within the limited time.  To be more concrete, the long working hours for people is ascribed to the problem of the system. Let me raise a Hong Kong example. The reason why doctors in Hong Kong need to work uninterruptedly is they are adopting the “on-call arrangement”. When there is no working time limit, the organization will not have incentives to improve the current situation. However, when the standard working hours is implemented, since the number of doctors has been increased a lot after the establishment of Hospital Authority, the hospitals will estimate the total working hours according to the number of patients and amount of workloads to employ enough doctors to shorten the working time. Furthermore, overtime pay must be higher than regular pay. As a result, production cost will be lower in the long run.

          In addition, people may argue that standard working hours could hamper industries from adjusting swiftly to market changes (Wong, 2009). If there is a big but temporary increase in demand, enterprises cannot request existing workers to work beyond the maximum working hours, so the working hours for production stage is inflexible. Yet, it does not mean that people cannot work beyond the standard working hours because there is overtime pay. In Germany, companies will try to have a collective agreement with employees. In Thailand, employees’ prior consent is required. As a result, Hong Kong can refer to the foreign examples to draw up the policy.

          Although economic development is important to show how strong their own countries or cities are, there is always one question that we should ask ourselves: Should we sacrifice people’s health to overtake the economic growth? Hong Kong ranked third in the World Competitiveness Ranking 2013 (International Institute for Management Development, 2013), just behind the strongest country USA and Switzerland, but both countries also have working hours limit. If we want to make our city more powerful and Hong Kong people happier, standard working hours policy should be carried out in no doubts.

         
Reference list

1.      A survey conducted by the Family and Group Practice Research Centre from Department of Social Work, The   Chinese University of Hong Kong
Available at: http://web.swk.cuhk.edu.hk/en/?id=2442&

2.      ILO, “Preamble, Reduction of Hours of Work Recommendation”, (1962, June 26)

       Available at: http://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:12100:0::NO::P12100_ILO_CODE:R116

3.      A study which has been conducted for 10 years, where there were 6000 British functionaries were involved
Available at: http://work.chron.com/disadvantages-overtime-5388.html

4.      Zhang, J. (2007, July). Overtime work is harmful, Common Health Magazine(104)
Available at: http://www.commonhealth.com.tw/article/article.action?id=5019769

5.      Cheung, S. (2012, 9 10), “Taxi driver dies after car plunges 18 metres off flyover in Ngau Tau Kok”, South China Morning Post 

Available at: http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1033011/taxi-driver-dies-after-car-plunges-18-metres-flyover-ngau-tau-kok

6.      Lin, K. S. (2013, July 17), “All worked up”, Time Out
Available at: http://www.timeout.com.hk/big-smog/features/59645/all-worked-up.html

7.      Bauhinia Foundation Research Centre, “Working Time Has Standard?”, (2013, April 26)
Available at: http://www.bauhinia.org/analyses_content.php?id=30

8.      Siu, P. (2013, April 1). “Standard work hours ‘won’t cost more’ in the long run.”, South China Morning Post
Available at: http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1204190/standard-work-hours-wont-cost-more-long-run

9.      Leung, K. (2011, March 15). “Standard working hours for doctors”, Apple Daily
Available at: http://hk.apple.nextmedia.com/news/art/20110315/15076079

10.  Wong, Y. (2009). Firms and Production: Legislation on Maximum Working Hours in Hong Kong. (p. 57). Hong Kong: Pearson Education Asia Limited.

11.  International Institute for Management Development, “IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook”, (2013), p.10
Available at: http://www.imd.org/uupload/imd.website/wcc/scoreboard.pdf

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[1] A survey conducted by the Family and Group Practice Research Centre from Department of Social Work, The   Chinese University of Hong Kong
   Source: http://web.swk.cuhk.edu.hk/en/?id=2442&

[2] A study which has been conducted for 10 years, where there were 6000 British functionaries were involved
   Available at: http://work.chron.com/disadvantages-overtime-5388.html