General strike against 13-hour work day brings Greece to a halt

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/01/general-strike-against-13-hour-day-brings-greece-to-a-halt

by Canal_Volphied

37 comments

  1. they are trying to implement a 13 hour workday? wtf is wrong with the legislature in greece, this is not a “general strike”, this is a societal immune response to lethal amounts of bullshit.

  2. 13h work day? What? We aren’t talking about that times 5 days right?

  3. 13 hours a day? 😐 Where the fuck are we? North Korea?

  4. I don’t see the issue to be honest. If somebody wants to work 13 hours a day, why not let them? My understanding is you will be paid overtime for hours 8-13. Probably pretty attractive for students or people doing seasonal work.

  5. It’s time to eat the rich I’m afraid. No fucking mercy.

  8. > The 13-hour day proposal is expected to be passed into law this month. The change would allow employees to clock in 13 hours, effectively extending their presence in the work place by up to five hours.

    Will this change existing contracts and how will this affect new contracts? Or is this meant to raise the maximum working hours (basically overtime) only if really needed and the roof is burning?

    For example in Germany the usual is 8hours at 5days. But you are allowed to work for up to 10h a day. With some rules regarding not to overuse this and how it must be compensated.

  9. Bow to the very reasonable demands of your corporate overlords. /s

  10. Typical left-wing hysteria. If you were to believe this rage baiting title, everyone would be forced to work 13 hours a day. Just read the comments. Hardly anyone read the whole article.

  11. 13 h workdays are already a standard in seasonal work i think soo theres that

  12. Most of the world is trying to lower it, guys!

    >Makis Kontogiorgos, a trade unionist from a major technology company, said:
    “[….] *People can’t be pushed like this; at some point there’ll be an explosion.*”

    Frankly, i think the word ‘pushed’ is very much understating this.

  13. Sounds like a sweet government. WTF is wrong with politicians, they just sit and talk and talk, how would they be holding up if working a real job for 13 hours.

  15. Look I’m all for social welfare, but I don’t understand why everyone in these comments is flipping out. It’s not like it’s normal full time working hours it’s overtime and cannot be used all the time.

    Austria, which has amazing employee rights and employment conditions, has something similar with a maximum of 12h overtime allowed but over the course of 17 weeks the average weekly overtime can’t exceed 48h. Most people don’t work 12h despite that. People are overreacting like crazy.

  16. Go komshu go. They must find other slaves to reach their ambitions. I wish we were that kind of culture. Here in Turkey people wouldn’t oppose if they make 20 hours work day. Some people even brag about it, like “I am very hardworking, working from 08:00 to 22:00”. Lets brag about how good slaves we are.

  17. Huh, I am allowed to work 16 hours if I want to. And I am from Sweden that is supposedly pretty strong when it comes to unions and have rep for being worker friendly.

  18. Power to the Greeks, doubt the politicians who want this will be working 13 hour shifts.

  20. Sadly it won’t make a difference in Greece.

    In Greece, it is common practice for employers to illegally and without recourse, do the following:

    – for an employee to sign a document that they’ve receive the 13th month or their holiday pay in cash, and then not paying the employee but pocketing it.

    – employees are often required to work a whole extra day, or many extra hours, without any additional pay

    – salary is paid several months late. And this is if you have a ‘good’ employer. A bad one can take 6 months or more.

    – employees are fired on the spot, often for taking too much sick leave. Court cases take 5+ years and are expensive, leading many fired workers to not even try to get anything.

    In sum: Greece is really MUCH further behind in employees rights than many Western Europeans think.

  21. Sometimes I feel like 8 hour work days is too much. 13 hours is insane

  22. Initially i thought it will be like, work till 11 then break 5 hours then work the rest due to weather extremes but 13 hours without a balance feels like abuse..i only heard in uk about a trial to do 10 hours days but work 4 days a week

  24. The article is paywalled so I am wondering if this is just to allow a 13 hour work day. There are certain jobs and industries where the long days are needed for certain tasks. Concrete work, chemical plants and mills come to mind. Some processes take time and cannot be stopped at artificially designated times.

  25. Reverting back to the pre-workers’ rights movements. That shit don’t end up well….

  26. Before commenting please check some history books on why it is even proposed.

    Greece for years had spent way more than it should. The latest budget cuts are still not enough to recover from gigantic debt from all social benefits in the past like „need to work by windows side 50 euro adding” or „need to go to work by steps 100%” addon.

  27. 13hour workday, brought to you by the government of ND who made the 6day working week.

    The same government that killed 57 people in Tempi and rushed to hide the evidence (Tempi scandal). The same government that was using phone spyware (Predator scandal) to bully and undermine their political opponents. The same government that uses national founds to pay the media and their lapdogs at “truth” team (Ομαδα Αλήθειας scandal). The same governement that used the agro-subsidies and money from EU (OPEKEPE scandal) to straight up buy votes in the last elections. The same governement that passed an anti-constitutional “law” for private universities (Private Universities Scandal). The same governement that leaked and used personal data to get Greek voters of diaspora to vote for it (Asimakopoulou e-mail scandal). The same governement that made “legal” paying doctors at public hospitals cause they cant manage the whole health sector (Health care/Adonis scandal). The same governement that gives jobs to the ND voters without qualifications (ΑΣΕΠ/απευθείας αναθέσεις scandal). The same government that let the whole Greece burn and FLOOD in less than a month’s time (biggest fires in EU history, 2023 and Floods). The same government and political party that has half a billion DEBT but DICTATES people pay their members and live in literal poverty (Nea Dimokratia debt scandal).

    ND is a corrupt (borderline criminal) organization that has somehow managed to pretend to be a political party.

    I personally BEG EU to sent as many prosecutors (like they recently done with Chief Prosecutor Laura Kövesi) in Greece to put an END to this in-humane, unethical and even criminally corrupt situation, we are heading otherwise in a very bloody future.

  28. Well there’s no legislation either in any European country preventing 13 hour work days anywhere. The working time directive only legislates for 11 hours rest break between shifts (hence 13 hours would be allowed) and there is no daily maximum so it could be enacted in any European country if that nation wanted to.

  29. I did a 16h-hour shift once at a restaurant/venue, serving tables during the afternoon, working a wedding bar in the evening and then clearing up and setting up for a wedding the next day. I could barely walk the following day.

    1/10 – Would not recommend.

  30. Haha of all the nations, the Greeks are the last ones who would stand for this. And rightfully so.

  31. 13 hour workday? I’m guessing that is also not with overtime.

    Don’t give my country any ideas! We’d be next under our current kakistocracy.

  32. Wow, 13 hours! That’s like half of some of my shifts. In healthcare both doctors and nurses are used to 13 hours or more.

  33. It’s not very clear from the article but can any Greeks explain what exactly the change is? Is there a legal limit for how long you can work that’s much lower than 13 hours currently?

    I work in a job where we regularly do 12 hour shifts but get more days off, but I imagine this much be a completely different thing if people are protesting.

  34. Populism is so boring. You can see reddit just reading a slogan title and going batshit.

    13 hours shifts will be optional up to 37 days a year with overtime pay of +40%. That’s what the law is. Many restaurant jobs and tourist sector work does this illegally right now, thus the government made it legal, with assurance of overtime pay.

Comments are closed.