Catalan companies save 603.2 million euros a year in unpaid overtime
Unpaid work has soared to 486,000 hours per week in recent years
Barcelona"Unpaid overtime is an endemic fraud in our society." A study prepared by the Comissions Obreres de Catalunya (CCOO) trade union quantifies the volume of extra hours worked by Catalans. It also points to a sharp increase in recent years: while in 2019 workers put in an average of 791,000 overtime hours per week, in the first quarter of this year the volume has risen to 1.02 million, representing an increase of 29.3%.
Furthermore, unpaid hours have seen an even more significant jump, by 43.9%, going from 309,018 to 444,667 weekly in the first quarter compared to 2019. The study was prepared using data from the first three months of the year, although the Active Population Survey (EPA) published this Tuesday raised the number of unpaid ones to 486,000. According to data collected by the union, this situation allows Catalan employers to save up to 11.6 million euros in unpaid overtime per week. Annually, therefore, workers stop receiving and contributing up to 603.2 million euros annually.
The volume of people doing these overtime hours has also increased sharply. In 2019, 108,447 people did paid or unpaid overtime, while during the first quarter of the year, the number of workers rose to 157,194 – 44.9% more. Regarding unpaid overtime, during the same period, employees who do it have almost doubled (they have risen by 89.1%) and have gone from 43,712 to 82,656 weekly on average during the first three months of the year.
For these reasons, CCOO considers the approval of the new time control regulation planned for after the summer to be "essential" to control the "abusive use" of this overtime. "It is a necessary measure," explained the general secretary of CCOO de Catalunya, Belén López, who also called for it to be a "digital, reliable and interoperable" control with the Labour Inspectorate. López also highlighted the increase in salaries and the control of the prices of basic products, "especially housing," as two complementary measures to combat the extra hours worked. In addition, the general secretary called for a reduction in working hours.
A gender bias
As explained by López and the union's secretary of economy and labor, Saida Ehliluch El Antit, these increases have been propelled by a strong gender bias. Specifically, women have seen the largest increase, by 117.7%, in their overtime hours, whether paid or unpaid, while men have reduced their extra hours by 11.9% during the same period. Regarding unpaid hours, women have gone from working 100,559 per week in 2019 to 244,054 in 2026, which represents an increase of 142.7%. In contrast, men have experienced a slight decrease: if in 2019 they worked an average of 208,459, during this first quarter they have worked 200,613.
By sectors, unpaid hours are concentrated in services, which account for 71.4% of the total, while construction and industry total 6.4% and 22.2%, respectively. Thus, the high concentration of unpaid overtime in services favors women being disadvantaged, as it is a more feminized sector labor-wise. By age, young people between 25 and 34 years old are the ones who do the most unpaid overtime, with a total of 54,084.
