THE FIVE-DAY WEEK
located in New York State, gave the following reason for
abandoning the five-day week:

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“Because of the passage of the most unpopular law with employees
which has ever been forced upon them. We wish members of your
organization could walk into our mill and talk to any employee at
random, soliciting their viewpoint. The management was better
satisfied with the five-day week. A woman is tired with nine hours
and fifteen minutes work but she would rather work thirty-five
minutes longer and have all day Saturday for herself.”

Experience with the five-day week as here recorded appears
 to have justified the anticipations of employers. This
statement is made advisedly. Where employers have expected
 reduced production, higher costs and lessened efficiency
 because of a union-enforced five-day week, they
apparently have not been disappointed. On the other hand,
where the experiment had been made with the hope that it
would work out satisfactorily, it usually has done so. Some
loss in production and in economy of operation has been
accepted by a number of employers, and some loss in earnings
 has been accepted by many employees without apparently
 destroying their belief that, so far as they are
concerned, the five-day week schedule is desirable.
That the experiment has worked out this way in most of
the cases studied does not necessarily mean that it will work
out similarly in all cases. Each company has its own problems
 to consider. A wider adoption of the five-day week
will destroy some of the advantages urged in its favor, but
will remove greater and more fundamental drawbacks, of
which the greatest is probably the competition with companies
 having a longer weekly working schedule.