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Government Building

The Greek legislature has given the green light a hotly debated work legislation that enables extended-length work shifts, in the face of strong resistance and nationwide strike actions.

Government officials stated the measure will update Greek work laws, but critics from the left-wing faction described it as a "regulatory disaster."

Main Provisions of the Recently Passed Labor Law

Under the freshly approved law, annual overtime is capped at one hundred and fifty hours, while the standard 40-hour week continues as before.

The government maintains that the longer workday is optional, only affects the business sector, and can only be applied for up to 37 days annually.

Parliamentary Backing and Opposition

Thursday's vote was backed by MPs from the governing centre-right party, with the centre-left faction – now the primary resistance – voting against the legislation, while the progressive party abstained.

Worker organizations have staged two general strikes calling for the bill's withdrawal recently that halted transportation and public services to a stop.

Government Justification and Worker Protections

The Labor Minister supported the bill, saying the reforms bring in line Greek legislation with current labor-market conditions, and alleged critics of misleading the citizens.

The laws will give employees the choice to take on extra work with the same employer for 40% higher compensation, while guaranteeing they will not be dismissed for refusing extra hours.

This complies with European Union labor rules, which limit the average week to forty-eight hours including extra hours but permit flexibility over 12 months, as stated by the administration.

Critical Perspectives and Union Reactions

However, opposition parties have accused the administration of weakening employee protections and "pushing the country back to a labor middle age." They say Greek workers currently work longer hours than the majority of EU citizens while earning less and still "face financial difficulties."

A major labor organization said flexible working hours in reality mean "the end of the standard workday, the destruction of personal time and the authorization of excessive labor."

Previous Labor Reforms and Financial Background

Last year, the country enacted a six-day working week for specific industries in a attempt to boost economic growth.

Recent laws, which came into effect at the beginning of the summer, allow workers to labor up to forty-eight hours in a workweek as instead of 40.

EU Work Data and Greek Economic Indicators

• Across the EU in 2024, the highest average hours were observed in Greece (39.8 hours), followed by Bulgaria, Poland (38.9) and Romania.
• The shortest working week in the union is in the Netherlands (32.1), as per Eurostat.
• As of January 2025, the nation's official base pay stood at nine hundred sixty-eight euros a month, ranking it in the bottom group among EU countries.
• Joblessness, which had peaked at twenty-eight percent during the economic downturn, was 8.1% in the summer compared with an EU average of 5.9%, data from the statistical office indicate.
• The country is improving since its decade-long debt crisis, which concluded in 2018, but salaries and living standards continue to be among the poorest in the EU.