Two California Assemblymembers are looking to make a four-day workweek the law of the land in the state, responding to the "Great Resignation" and post-pandemic malaise about work.

The eight-hour workday has been the standard since Henry Ford first adopted it in the 1920s. In 1938, the Fair Labor Standards Act set the work week at 44 hours, also establishing overtime payment requirements and a minimum wage, and creating age requirements for work. In 1940, the act that was amended to change the workweek to 40 hours, and ever since, it’s been not just the standard, but the law.

Even as that law passed, there were already people advocating for a shorter workweek than that, with some senators pushing for the standard to be set at 30 hours. Now, there’s a bill in the works in California that would bring the workweek closer to what those lawmakers envisioned.

Assembly Bill 2932 would set the workweek at 32 hours rather than 40. Any time worked past the 32-hour mark would fall into overtime, which would start at 1.5x pay. Past 12 hours worked, that jumps to 2x pay.

The bill would only apply to companies with 500 or more employees.

California Assemblymembers Cristina Garcia (D-Los Angeles County) and Evan Low (D-Santa Clara County) co-authored the bill.

“We’re hearing time and time again about greater worker flexibility,” said Assemblymember Low. “That’s what workers are demanding, and this provides us an opportunity to reimagine the workforce, uplifting the voices of workers, while also helping to ensure that we can do the type of things in a more efficient manner, and also taking care of our family and our loved ones.”

Assemblymember Garcia told the Los Angeles Times that she believes the pandemic allowed people to reimagine what the workweek could and should look like.

"We’ve had a five-day work week since the Industrial Revolution, but we’ve had a lot of progress in society, and we’ve had a lot of advancements,” said Garcia.

The California Chamber of Commerce, however, is starkly opposed to the bill. The Chamber added AB 2932 to its “Job Killer” list, arguing it, “Significantly increases labor costs by imposing an overtime pay requirement after 32 hours and other requirements that are impossible to comply with, exposing employers to litigation under the Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA).”

The CalChamber even sent a letter to Assemblymember Low, saying labor costs would be “untenable for many businesses” if AB 2932 were put into place.

“The repeated assumption by the Legislature that businesses with more than 500 employees can absorb these costs is deeply flawed. It does not take into account that businesses often operate on thin profit margins and that the number of employees you have does not dictate financial success,” the letter reads.

Researchers say that logic is flawed. Across the world, managers of companies that switched to three-day weekends said they saw higher productivity and increased employee satisfaction. Employees took fewer sick days and overhead costs within the office went down.

“Companies that make the switch may find it makes for a better work-life balance, allowing team members to become more engaged and more efficiently use their time and company resources,” Forbes reports.

The concept is not as new as we may think. The Society for Humane Research Management says 23% of organizations have already switched to a four-day workweek, and ZipRecruiter says its seen three times the number of postings mentioning four-day workweeks in 2022 as it did in 2019.  

AB 2932 has been referred to the Labor and Employment Committee. It has not yet been put up for a vote in the Assembly.

Photo: Marten Bjork on Unsplash

It's the last afternoon of the last day of 2015, and you're still at work?

And, yet, your job is non-demanding enough that you have time to be reading this. So why not just go home?

I'm sure you have a great reason. Maybe you're downloading something, or are expecting a colleague to send you a critical, end-of-year piece of information. Or perhaps you're just waiting for your boss to leave so you can! (In the early days of SFist, I wrote almost all my posts waiting for my day job boss to leave, because I had no work to do but was expected to sit outside her office just in case something came up. Good times!)

We urge you to share the reason you're stuck staring at a screen instead of doing, well, anything else on this, the final day of the year. Obviously, we're still here too, so we sympathize.

Note: If you're not at work, or killing time somewhere equally dreary (public transit, perhaps, or a waiting room somewhere), get off the internet. Go live your life.

The gods are truly smiling on San Francisco. Today is the Presidents Day holiday, and it's unbelievably gorgeous out: sunny and warm even in typically chillier areas like the Excelsior and Outer Sunset. But though I see a whole lot of shorts-clad people sauntering down Irving to Ocean Beach, not all of us get to take today off.

Yes, most San Francisco city and county offices are closed for the holiday today, as are the courts and the library. San Francisco public schools are, surprisingly, in session, but they're taking Thursday and Friday off, to the frustration of some parents.

Transit is also scarcer today, with both BART and Muni running on a Saturday schedule, which means fewer vehicles that run less frequently. Parking meters and seven day street sweeping will be enforced in SF, but residential parking permits and Monday-Friday daytime street sweeping and commuter towaway rules will not be enforced today.

But, our personal and professional desire for numerous readers aside, why are you even reading this? You should be outside, or at the very least, on a comfortable couch (those nine DVRed episodes of Madame Secretary won't watch themselves).

Are you stuck at work? If so, why? Lay it on us.

Related: Top 10 Ways To Get Out Of Work Today

Look, it's too late to call in sick. You're already at your desk. Hindsight is 20/20, and you fucked up. But the weather today will be record-breaking. It's park weather. It's warm weather. In January. And you're stuck behind a computer right now, wondering if there are any 100 Grand Bars left in the vending machine. (There are none; they won't be restocked until next Tuesday.) But it's not too late. You can get out of work today, if you play it smart. If you're willing. If you use one of these helpful tips:

1. Pet emergency. The dog walker called and you need to go pick up Sapphire at the vet. (Next day explain that she just ate a garbage bag, pooped it out later, and everything was fine.)

2. Food poisoning is always popular. The more specific the better. ("The same thing happened last week when I ate arugula. Maybe I'm allergic?" is a good line.)

3. Oral surgery / emergency dental work

4. Emergency plumbing issue - need to wait for plumber

5. Garage door broken, need to wait for repair to get my car out. (Say your spouse has to go to work, so you'll need to telecommute for the rest of the day.)

6. Landlord and/or roommate emergency is always a winner [Ed. note: The SFist staff has used this many times with great success!]

7. Anything that's contagious. (Poison oak rash, flu, etc. People will beg you to stay home. Rap your arm or thigh several times with a ruler if asked to present physical evidence.)

8. Car impounded

9. Too hungover to work. (Only works if your boss is an alcoholic. Also, this could result in your termination/intervention. Tread lightly.)

10. Emergency call. (There's an app that calls you so you can fake an emergency situation.)

Note: As any manager can tell you, Muni/BART-related excused are the weakest. You can get to almost anywhere in SF in one hour by foot. Also, you can jump on AC or take a cab over the bridge. Plus, Muni/Bart snafus are tracked online.

Jay Barmann, Andrew Dalton, Rose Garrett, and Brock Keeling contributed to this article/used some or all of these excuses with great success.

Ugh.

It's so nice out. All the other kids are outside playing capture the flag, but mom is making us stay inside to practice violin. But you should try to get outside while you can. It's goddam gorgeous. Have you seen it? It's bullshit. Ideally, you would be halfway through a pot truffle and knee-deep in banana hammocks on the fruit shelf. Instead, you're probably at work. Alas.

We feel your pain, folks. If it helps, this is the view form our desk today. (Those pink Post-its have been there for MONTHS.)

The weather this weekend should be just as nice, though not as hot. 70-degree temperatures will grace San Francisco on Saturday. Enjoy.

A man who used to work for a noted San Francisco adult film studio is now suing the porn purveyor's company for emotional distress and related health problems after pricking himself while injecting actors' penises with a hardening substance. Ronald Baker of San Francisco has filed suit against Adult Entertainment Broadcast Network (AEBN), a North Carolina-based company that owns local porn producers Raging Stallion where Baker worked as a stagehand.

Baker's complaint against his former employers are twofold. First, after letting AEBN know that he was worried that he might have contracted HIV after the worrisome needle prick, "his bosses told him they did not know what to do." Second, after finding out that the hot-yet-flaccid models did not have prescriptions for TriMix, the magic potion used to make their dicks rock hard, he refused to pump further injections for fear of violating state law.

"They are injecting a controlled substance into all these models without checking with a doctor if it's OK for that person to have that prescription medication, and they are using people on the set to give the shots," Stewart tells the Chronicle. "You have to be a nurse in the state of California to give an injection."

We should mention that the practice of injecting porn stars' penises with hardening substances — e.g., Caverject, et al. — long pre-dates Viagra. Which is to say, it's not at all an uncommon practice in the porn industry.

The traumatized former employee seeks unspecific damages for "wrongful termination, emotional distress and violations of labor and professional business codes."

It's almost 4 o'clock the Friday before Labor Day Weekend. So... why are you still at the office? Presumably, most of you are working 9 to 5, right? And with such doldrums comes relief that can only be found into the warm arms of SFist (thanks for reading!) and stolen office supplies. But, really, should already be out getting a jump start on your weekend now, yes?

Please explain yourself. If you need an excuse, please tell your boss we said it was okay to leave early. If your boss won't relent, you are clearly working for a power-hungry tyrant who wants you to be miserable. Tell them we said that, too.

This one shouldn't come as too much of a surprise: BCN, reports on the Appeal that the same Chicago consulting firm responsible for telling your boss you don't actually get anything done during March Madness has pointed out that San Francisco's population of office workers probably haven't been getting a lot of work done this week due to the Giants NL Championship Series against the Phillies. Even if you're not completely skipping out on work to head to the bar, you're probably streaming coverage to your desktop or getting short, timely updates from Brian Wilson's beard sent directly to your phone instead of actually getting work done. And that doesn't even include being hungover after last night's cliffhanger.

On the other hand, the firm (who must be pretty bored around the office without a Chicago team to root for in the postseason) points out that in the long run, games like this current series could be a positive for local companies since "the loss of productivity is offset by the sense of camaraderie that comes with rooting for the hometown team." Awww.
[Appeal]

Wait, you're at work today? On this Independence Day work-week holiday?

We feel your pain all too well.

If you're not like 85% of the Bay Area -- who have been given the day off to head to more summer-y locales to barbecue assorted meats and blow shit up, or get to watch KRON 4's Darya Folsom work her magic -- please tell us why you have to work today. Are you still in the office? Commiserate here to share your stories of sadness with other unfortunate souls chained to their desks.

Because that's just sad, being stuck at work today. Seriously, from the windows at SFist headquarters, there are, like, eight people walking along Third Street. Are you one of them?

(By Eyleen Tavy)

After a disturbingly easy commute, no line at Blue Bottle, and 15 minutes spent deleting the zillions of Out of Office emails that cluttered our inbox, we're ready to face the day. And, in the words of that damned Carrie Bradshaw, we had to wonder just who at work today? We know why we're here (absent boss, parsimonious with vacation days, Bagel Radio's 480 Minutes sounds better on our office computer), but what about you?

Is your area of business (SoMa? FiDi? Where else?) as 28 Days Later as ours is? Are you alone in the building -- and, if so, can we come over and rifle through your colleagues' stuff? Why the hell did you show up for work today? Let us know in the comments.