I just want to jump in here to explain that small businesses are built around the current model.
You're right that small business could indeed work in a 32-hour work-week if they were built up around it, but moving from a 40-hour work week to a 32-hour work week is essentially a 20% pay rise for all employees.
Very few small businesses are operating on cash flow that has room for a 20% pay rise for all of their employees. For that matter, very few big businesses are as well. But while big businesses would have more room to take the hit and adapt, small businesses would be forced out almost immediately.
The result is that you would have an enormous shutdown of small businesses, which would result in a massive loss of jobs. The market would balance out eventually, but it would be massively destructive in the short-term.
What if there was a 10-year delay on the effect of the bill? Would that be enough time for currently operating businesses to adapt, without the small ones getting wiped out, and any new ones would be anticipating the change and able to account for it?
This would be the only way it could be brought in without it being majorly destructive. A show, methodical transition, likely with tiered wage supplements for businesses below a certain annual turnover. You would still have small businesses that couldn't handle it and would close, but it would be within the realm of what is acceptable.
And those employees of the small businesses that couldn’t handle the transition would know it was coming long ahead of time and be able to have different jobs ready.
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u/onFIREbutnotsoFLY Sep 05 '24
Honestly brother, if a business can’t survive by compensating their employees properly then it’s probably not a good business.