WORLD> America
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WORLD> America
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Workers shifting to 4-day week to save gasoline
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-05-30 10:13 CINCINNATI - When Ohio's Kent State University offered custodial staff the option of working four days a week instead of five to cut commuting costs, most jumped at the chance, part of a US trend aimed at combating soaring gasoline prices. "We offered it to 94 employees and 78 have taken us up on it," said university spokesman Scott Rainone.
The reason is simple: rising gas prices and a desire to retain good workers. And while so far only the university's custodians are eligible, Rainone hopes the option will be offered to all departments -- including his own. "In our office, we have people who travel anywhere from five or six miles to a couple who are on the road 45 to 50 minutes," Rainone said. "As the price of gas rises, the level of grumbling rises." Regular gasoline averages $3.94 a gallon in the United States, up 33 cents in the past month and 88 cents since the beginning of the year, the Energy Information Administration said this week. The federal government has offered four-day workweeks to eligible employees for years as part of a flexible work program that also includes telecommuting. But the surge in gasoline prices is pushing more private employers as well as local governments to offer a four-day week as a perk that eliminates two commutes a week. Staff at Neighborhood Development Services in rural northeastern Ohio were talking about quitting to find work closer to their homes when executive director Dave Vaughan stepped in with offers to compress their work week. "I didn't want to lose people," Vaughan said of the program, which more than half of his 19 employees began last week. "In rural areas like we are, gas price increases are more challenging because we don't have the mass transit alternative -- we can't jump on a bus or take a train." Eventually, Vaughan hopes to close the office one day a week, further reducing energy costs. In America's struggling automaking heartland, the shorter workweek offers employers a way of rewarding employees when the budget does not allow a salary increase, said Oakland County, Michigan, executive L. Brooks Patterson. "By allowing employees to work four 10-hour days it will save them 20 percent on their commute costs and ease the financial pinch of filling up their cars," said Patterson, who last week proposed the compressed week for county workers. Gasoline prices have begun altering US commutes in many ways, a survey released on Thursday showed. CHANGING HABITS Some 44 percent of respondents said they have changed the way they commute -- doing things such as sharing a ride or driving a more fuel-efficient car -- or are working from home or looking for a closer job in order to reduce gasoline costs, according to staffing services company Robert Half International. That's up from 34 percent two years ago. |
