Scheduling Stability: The Landscape of Work Schedules and Potential Gains From Fairer Workweeks in Illinois and Chicago

49 Pages Posted: 15 May 2018

See all articles by Alison Dickson

Alison Dickson

University of Illinois at Chicago

Lonnie Golden

Pennsylvania State University - Abington College; Economic Policy Institute; Project for Middle Class Renewal

Robert Bruno

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Date Written: April 24, 2018

Abstract

Fair Workweek legislation has sprung up organically around the country in response to the prevalence and consequences of work schedules that may be unstable, unpredictable or unreliable. Labor standards need to be updated to deal with the widespread use of last minute, on-call or inadequate work hours, and their adverse consequences for workers. A new survey of 1,717 workers throughout the state of Illinois workers was conducted between October, 2017 – March, 2018, including full-time, part-time and non-standard (e.g., contractor, temp) workers. It oversamples Chicago residents, low and middle income households and hourly paid workers. It uses both online and in-person survey collection methods. Over 40 percent of hourly paid workers have at least occasional on-call work, often with very short advance notice, and almost half have little to no input into their daily work schedules. Over a third of all workers have less than one week’s advance notice of their schedule and almost half have a preference to work more hours for more income. Irregular shift working and hours - underemployment are both higher among part time workers. From the findings, a list of public policy recommendations are offered to address the erratic work schedules and their documented work-life time conflict consequences found here for working people.

Keywords: Work Schedules; Predictive Scheduling; Work Hours; Employment Policy

JEL Classification: J08; J2; J3

Suggested Citation

Dickson, Alison and Golden, Lonnie and Bruno, Robert, Scheduling Stability: The Landscape of Work Schedules and Potential Gains From Fairer Workweeks in Illinois and Chicago (April 24, 2018). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3172354 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3172354

Alison Dickson

University of Illinois at Chicago ( email )

1200 W Harrison St
Chicago, IL 60607
United States

Lonnie Golden (Contact Author)

Pennsylvania State University - Abington College ( email )

1600 Woodland Rd.
Abington, PA 19001
United States
215-881-7596 (Phone)
215-881-7333 (Fax)

Economic Policy Institute ( email )

1660 L Street NW, Suite 1200
Washington, DC 20036
United States

Project for Middle Class Renewal ( email )

1408 W. Gregory Dr.
Urbana, IL Champaign 61801
United States

Robert Bruno

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ( email )

601 E John St
Champaign, IL Champaign 61820
United States

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
124
Abstract Views
914
Rank
409,537
PlumX Metrics