Zurich sets framework for 35-hour working-week pilot

Zurich is putting a shorter working week to the test—and the experiment begins with a seven-hour cut. The city government has approved the legal framework for a one-year pilot that would allow selected shift workers to work 35 hours instead of 42, without losing pay. That amounts to a reduction of roughly 16.7% in weekly hours, one of the most consequential labour-policy trials yet proposed by Switzerland’s largest city.

The target group is deliberately practical rather than symbolic: police officers, public transport employees and carers are among the workers who could take part. These services run around the clock, making them a far tougher test than a conventional office-based four-day week. Zurich has not yet chosen the department that will host the trial, and the proposal still goes before a city-parliament committee next Wednesday.

The framework arrives after more than three years of political and administrative wrangling. City councillors first backed the demand in March 2023 by 60 votes to 57, after David Garcia Nuñez of the Alternative List argued that Zurich needed to ease the pressure on workers. The city now moves from slogan to scrutiny: can fewer hours deliver healthier working lives without weakening essential public services?

The pilot’s biggest question is not whether workers want fewer hours—it is whether the city can keep the public service moving. Shift work leaves little room for easy savings. A police roster cannot simply close for an afternoon; trams must run, and care homes cannot pause when staffing becomes tight.

That is why the city’s directive treats the trial as a controlled test. It will apply only to a selected group and run for one year, with an option to extend it by up to another year. Officials can then examine staffing levels, service quality, sickness absence, scheduling and financial consequences before considering any broader decision.

The approach also acknowledges a legal and political tension. Participants may receive different working conditions from other municipal employees, but the city argues that this unequal treatment is deliberate and lawful because the pilot is designed to test a model that could eventually benefit a much wider workforce. It is not, officials say, a special privilege handed to one group.

The unresolved department matters. A trial in transport, policing or care would expose different pressures—and produce very different lessons. Until Zurich names the host, the headline reform remains a framework rather than a functioning roster.

A full rollout could cost Zurich up to CHF110 million and demand as many as 1,500 extra employees. Those figures turn a popular work-life-balance idea into a hard question about public finances and Switzerland’s strained labour market.

The estimate applies if the shorter week were extended across the entire city administration with no reduction in pay. The pilot itself will be narrower, but its results will be judged against precisely this larger possibility. If productivity gains offset the lost hours, the city could build a case for expansion. If services require substantial replacement staff, the financial arithmetic could stop the reform in its tracks.

Daniel Leupi, a Green Party councillor who had warned about the proposal during debate, called it a “massively resource-intensive experiment.” He also questioned whether Zurich’s human-resources department could manage the scheme and challenged the city’s ability to recruit enough people. His warning lands in a country already confronting shortages in several skilled occupations.

The contrast is stark: workers could gain time, recovery and potentially better health, while the city could face higher payroll and recruitment costs. Zurich is therefore testing not only a timetable, but whether public-sector productivity can rise fast enough to finance it.

International evidence offers encouragement—but no easy blueprint. Zurich’s directive points to Iceland, where two pilot schemes showed that shorter hours could work in some public services when organisations changed how work was done. Police departments broadly held costs steady by cutting meeting times, reorganising shifts and using digital technology more efficiently.

Healthcare delivered a more sobering lesson. Maintaining cost neutrality proved considerably harder, a warning that will resonate in Zurich’s care sector, where staffing needs follow patients rather than office timetables. Sweden provides another caution. Several smaller trials needed extra employees to cover the reduction in hours, and the additional costs kept the initiatives at pilot stage instead of turning them into national reforms.

These examples sharpen the test facing Zurich. A successful trial will need to demonstrate more than satisfied participants. It must show that rosters remain stable, services do not deteriorate and the city does not simply transfer pressure to colleagues who remain on the old schedule.

The city’s experiment could become a Swiss reference point if it identifies workable efficiencies. But if it confirms that care and other round-the-clock services require costly reinforcements, Zurich may instead establish the limits of the shorter-week model.

Zurich’s decision advances locally while the canton remains firmly unconvinced. In September 2024, the cantonal parliament rejected a Green Party motion seeking a study of the 35-hour week by 111 votes to 57. Supporters cited potential health benefits and positive experiences from companies and foreign trials; opponents warned that shorter hours could intensify staff shortages and drive up wage costs.

That divide now gives the city pilot unusual significance. Zurich is not imposing a shorter week across Switzerland, but it is creating a live test inside one of the country’s most prominent public administrations. The evidence could influence future debates far beyond the city, particularly as employees and employers grapple with recruitment, burnout and the demands of round-the-clock services.

The next decision belongs to the city-parliament committee, which is due to discuss the directive next Wednesday. The timing of its final decision remains unclear, as does the department that will carry the burden of proof.

For Swiss workers, the message is immediate: the 42-hour norm is no longer politically untouchable. For Zurich officials, however, the real verdict will come later—when the city must show whether 35 hours can protect both public services and the people who deliver them.