Overworked Vietnamese youth losing their social life

Hoa works as a factory worker, enduring 12-hour shifts, including four hours of overtime. She is diligent and earns a decent living, but the demands of her job leave her constantly tired and sleepy. She has no social life, rarely meets anyone and spends her weekends at home, catching up on sleep or resting in the room she shares with two other roommates.

Her daily routine is grueling. She wakes up at 5:30 a.m. to arrive at work by 5:55 a.m. and returns home around 6:30 p.m. Her evenings are spent on basic chores: showering, doing laundry and preparing meals for the next day. Social outings, like meeting friends for a meal or coffee, are rare. Taking a vacation to nearby places like Vung Tau or Phan Thiet is a luxury, not just financially but also in terms of time. With limited paid holidays, she saves them for emergencies.

My wife and I occasionally ask Hoa about her thoughts on dating and marriage. She admits that her work leaves her little time or energy to meet anyone. Her youth is slowly slipping away behind the factory doors.

Hoa's situation is not unique. Many young people in Vietnam face similar challenges, with their work impeding important life milestones, including marriage and childbirth. Hoa once mentioned that if she had just one more day off each month, she could do so much more. A small vacation to a neighboring province, meeting new people, or even starting to date someone could become possible. She believes that with more rest and time off, she and her colleagues would work more effectively.

Vietnam's Labor Law mandates that laborers work no more than 48 hours a week, typically six days a week, with recommendations for a 40-hour work week. However, according to the International Labor Organization (ILO), Vietnam is among the countries with the longest work weeks. In 2023, the average laborer in Southeast Asia worked 40.1 hours per week. In Vietnam, the total annual working hours, after deducting public holidays, is 2,320 hours, 440 hours more than in Indonesia, 184 more than in Cambodia and 176 more than in Singapore.

As of 2022, only four countries had work weeks longer than 48 hours: Bhutan, the UAE, Lesotho and Qatar. About one-third of countries, including Vietnam, enforce a 48-hour maximum work week. Vietnam has only 11 public holidays, below the regional and global average. For comparison, Cambodia has 28 public holidays, Laos 12, Malaysia 13, Myanmar 14, Brunei 15, Indonesia 16, Japan 16, Thailand 16, the Philippines 19, and China 21.

Workers at a garment factory in Vietnam. Photo by Reuters

In Vietnam, private-sector workers endure longer hours than public-sector workers, who have enjoyed a five-day work week since 1999. For workers like Hoa, having two days off on the weekends is crucial. It allows time to rest, take care of family, shop, travel, and most importantly, recover for the coming work week.

The Vietnam General Confederation of Labor has recently proposed reducing the work week to less than 48 hours. This is not the first time such a proposal has been made. Policymakers in Vietnam must carefully consider this change, as it could significantly impact the country’s global competitiveness and foreign direct investment.

Employers in Vietnam have expressed concerns that reducing working hours without improving productivity could increase costs and decrease economic competitiveness. They argue that maintaining the same compensation for fewer hours of work would be challenging.

However, productivity is not solely dependent on the number of hours worked, but rather on the effectiveness of laborers during those hours and the technology used in production. Research by the Center for Research and Consultancy in Economics and Business at the National Economics University in Vietnam indicates that national productivity, especially in developing countries like Vietnam, depends primarily on the economy’s scale, economic restructuring processes, labor quality, technological advancements, management, organization and the effective deployment of resources.

Addressing these factors will take time, but in the long run, Vietnam cannot rely on long working hours to make up for other deficiencies. A shift toward more sustainable and effective productivity measures is necessary for the country’s future.

*Dang Quynh Giang is a Vietnamese lawyer.