This year marks the sixteenth annual Go Home on Time Day (GHOTD), an initiative of the Centre for Future Work at the Australia Institute, that shines a spotlight on the maldistribution of working hours and the scale of unpaid overtime worked by Australians.

The Australian labour market has remained relatively strong over 2024 although interest rate rises have pushed unemployment to over four per cent. Recent growth in wages has not been enough to take pressure off household budgets, or to offset the major reductions in real wages that occurred following the COVID pandemic. Across the economy, large numbers of workers want more paid work hours. However, the underemployment problem co-exists with overwork and with unpaid overtime that contributes to the loss of substantial amounts of income for working households.

During the past two years there has been a great deal of public attention and debate about a right to disconnect from work outside work hours. New “Right to Disconnect” laws came into effect in August 2024. While it is early days, these laws could already be having a positive impact including through raised awareness that workers should be free to enjoy their personal time without work demands. Our research indicates that unpaid overtime hours were fewer in 2024 than in previous years, both pre- and post-COVID pandemic years.

Unpaid overtime
On average, employees reported they performed 3.6 hours of unpaid work in the week of the survey, equivalent to       10.9% of total working hours.  This unpaid overtime equates to 188 hours per year per worker, or almost five standard 38-hour work weeks.

•  If  unpaid overtime were valued at median wage rates, this means the average worker is losing $7,713 per year or $297 a fortnight.
• At the economy-wide level, this equates to more than $91 billion of lost income per year.

The personal and social costs of unpaid overtime, through working outside of normal hours, include negative consequences for health and wellbeing and relationships:

• Four in ten workers report physical tiredness (42%) and feeling mentally drained (40%)A third of workers experience stress or anxiety (32%), and one in four experienced interference with personal life/relationships (29%).One in five workers experience disrupted sleep (22%).
  • One in three workers (36%) indicate that unpaid overtime is either expected or encouraged in their workplace.
•  The most common reason for working outside scheduled work hours is too much work (41%), with the second most common reason being staff shortages when other staff are absent or on leave (31%).

Dissatisfaction with working hours
Across the whole labour market, almost half of all employed workers (45%) are unsatisfied with their working hours – wanting either more or fewer hours.
o One in three workers (32%) reported that they wanted more paid hours. This desire was especially strong among workers in casual jobs (51%). Over four in ten workers (43%) aged 18 to 30 years of age wanted more paid hours.
o Just over half of workers (55%) indicated their hours were about right.

To calculate how much pay you are losing through unpaid overtime go to our unpaid overtime calculator at gohomeontimeday.org.au