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

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.