Evolution Of Forty-Hour Work Week

In the first lines of Dolly Parton’s country classic “Nine to Five”, she sings “Workin ' 9 to 5 what a way to make a livin ' / Barely gettin ' by, it 's all takin ' and no givin '” (Parton, 1980, p. 01). Parton’s song, along with many other pop culture references and scientific studies, narrates the daily struggles of average American employees working a standard forty-hour weekly shift. The “Nine to Five” shift or traditional forty-hour work week is infamous in America’s culture, both corporate and public, and has been immortalized since its creation. However, despite the established conception of the forty-hour work week as unchanging and dominating, the American work week has evolved throughout history and continues to evolve as society

While the forty-hour work week was officially established with the signing of a single bill, the history of the legislation and the American work week is deeply rooted in the transformation of America. The Industrial Revolution of the nineteenth century radically altered the industrial culture of the United States, which had previously consisted of thirteen colonies that were dependent upon agriculture and small-scale, domestic production. During the period, cities, factories, and industries developed, turning the country into a commercial and material nation. As production capacity increased, the need for laborers increased and factories often required employees to work many onerous hours in hazardous conditions. Moreover, lower class workers, along with women and children, were exploited for their labor capacity and paid extremely miniscule salaries for strenuous and perilous hours of work. To illustrate, in an article from the Economic History Association, Robert Whaples (2001) reports that “In the 1800s, many Americans worked seventy hours or more per week and the length of the workweek became an important political issue” (para. 1). The duration of the American work week remained a pivotal issue, and as time progressed, the opinion of the American continually changed, especially during momentous eras such as World War I, World War II, and the Great Depression. The dynamic change in American opinion led to the creation of many political movements and local pieces of legislation; however, all the movements culminated into the Fair Labor Standards Act. According to which was passed under the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, a leader who was instrumental in recharging the American economy during the Great Depression. According to an article by Jonathan Grossman (1978), a former historian of the United States Department of Labor, the Fair Labor Standards Act, which was enacted in 1938 under President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, “banned