Labor history

Shoppers stop to listen to one of several bands and one-man shows that entertained and amused the public on downtown Athens's Ermou Street off Syntagma Square on Saturday. Shops in many parts of Greece will stay open through the weekend - as they had done before Christmas - in response to the spike in business due to the holidays.

Around Easter at the end of April and Christmas in December - this will be the two periods next year, when we will have more days off.
 

How about working not five days, but four days a week? Perhaps at the moment this seems to be impossible, but many employers are now considering shortening the number of working days in order to attract more employees and stimulate the productivity of their staff.

On 21 June 2018, the Council agreed its negotiating position (general approach) on the directive on work-life balance for parents and carers. On the basis of this mandate, the Council Presidency will start negotiations with the European Parliament once the latter has adopted its position.

29% of EU citizens between the ages of 20 and 34 usually work on weekends, according to Eurostat. Our country is below the average for the community - just under 20% are engaged at the time most people rest.

Precarity is a still river that runs deep. Every now and then a public discussion is started about it. Some ten people gather in front of the ministry demanding better working conditions for individual groups of workers who are in especially difficult situations. And that's about it.

Contract workers employed at municipalities across Attica brave the wet weather to stage a demonstration outside the Interior Ministry in Athens, on Thursday. Their labor union, OTA, declared a work stoppage Thursday demanding the permanent hiring of contract workers by local authorities and the immediate recruitment of more staff to plug gaps in services.

Polish President Andrzej Duda on Tuesday signed into law a bill that largely limits trade on Sundays, saying it will benefit employees' family life.

The Onassis Cultural Center is putting on a virtual reality extravaganza this weekend, with back-to-back screenings on Saturday and Sunday starting at noon and ending at 9 p.m. The event is a celebration of the successful marriage between film and technology that is reshaping the landscape of cinema as we know it by attracting the interest of acclaimed directors.

An advisory body to the German government has recommended that Berlin loosen the country's employment law, allowing companies to ask employees to work more than eight hours per day; they say the change is needed to meet the challenges of the digital era.