Gallup Poll: Most Full-Time Workers Put in More Than 40 Hours

The 40-hour work week is usually regarded as the standard for full-timers, but many adults are working 47 hours or more a week, and some are clocking in for at least 50 hours, a new Gallup Poll released for Labor Day weekend reveals.

According to data from Gallup's Work and Education Survey, which combines samples for 2013 and 2014 and includes 1,032 adults who work full-time, half said they work at least 47 hours a week, and four out of 10 said they work 50 hours.

It's usually salaried workers who end up logging in more hours, Gallup reports. Hourly workers are often restricted by employers who don't want or can't afford to pay them overtime hours, but salaried workers don't earn overtime pay. As a result, people who work on salary generally work about five more hours a week, or 49 hours versus 44 hours, than do people who earn hourly wages, the survey revealed.

A full 25 percent of salaried workers said they put in at least 60 hours a week, meaning that even though their salaries put them at a higher income bracket than their hourly wage counterparts, they do lose a great deal more personal time in exchange.

Sometimes full-time workers have more than one job. Gallup data shows that 86 percent of workers only hold one job, but 12 percent have two and one percent have three or more jobs. But Gallup found that people with only one job still work an average of 46 hours a week.

The amount of hours people work has mostly stayed steady over the past 14 years except in 2004-2005, when there was dip to just shy of 45 hours a week.

Meanwhile, about 43 percent of the respondents said they work full-time, down from 50 percent in polls conducted before the 2007-2009 recession. Part-time workers have remained about 9 percent.

But this doesn't necessarily mean that workers logging long hours are suffering. Employees report that having an engaging job and workplace fosters well-being, even among workers who are on the job for more than 40 hours a week, Gallup Business Journal reports.

The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 4 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level.

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