Nearly three-fourth of working adults say they have little or no control over their work schedules. Excessive employer demands for mandatory overtime are creating real family and caregiving crises, and more and more workers report they are required to work odd and irregular shifts.
Workers today need greater control and predictability in their work schedules so they can plan for and attend to family needs without losing time from their job or suffering pay cuts. Flexible work hours, compressed workweeks, shift swaps and telecommuting can be effective work-family benefits, but they are not universally available. In fact, workplaces most often make them available only to highly paid employees. One study found that flextime is available to nearly two-thirds (62 percent) of workers with incomes of more than $71,000 a year but to less than one-third (31 percent) of working parents with incomes less than $28,000. So the workers who most need supportive workplace policies to help them meet their family responsibilities are least likely to have them.
Making work really work for working families¡Xincluding those with low incomes¡Xwill require workplace practices and public policies that ease the burdens of combining family and work. But workers¡| need for genuine flexibility has been twisted by employer groups and anti-worker legislators into an opportunity to radically roll back workers¡| rights.
For some workers, part-time, temporary and on-call work can bring greater flexibility. But too many workers are forced into these alternative work arrangements not because they want them but because employers demand them or fail to offer permanent, full-time jobs. Workers in these jobs typically earn less and receive fewer employer-provided benefits than similar workers in full-time, permanent positions. The only way to ensure that workers are not exploited and that alternative work schedules truly are a matter of choice is to extend equal pay and fair benefits to part-timers and others in nonstandard work arrangements.
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