Embargoed until 10:45am – 9 December 2008
New survey results describe people's working lives
Almost two-thirds of employed people in New Zealand (62.7 percent) said they usually work all their hours at standard
working times, between 7am and 7pm, Monday to Friday, Statistics New Zealand said today.
Results from the Survey of Working Life also showed that 59.2 percent of employed people who worked in the four weeks
prior to the interview had done so at a non-standard time at least once in that period.
Of those who had worked at a non-standard time, it was most common to have worked in the weekend (85.4 percent). Over
half (56.5 percent) of those who had worked at a non-standard time had done so more than five times in the last four
weeks, while 36.2 percent had worked at a non-standard time on more than 10 occasions.
The survey found that 9.4 percent of employees were temporary employees. Over half of these (52.0 percent) were further
classified as casual workers. Of all temporary employees, 55.6 percent were female.
This compared with 46.0 percent of all employed people.
Of all employees, 57.9 percent were on an individual employment agreement, 26.8 percent were on a collective employment
agreement, and 15.2 percent were not aware of being on any agreement or did not know what type of agreement they had.
Around half of employees (47.4 percent) had (or sometimes had) flexible hours in their main job, 21.9 percent of
employees had done some of their work from home in the past four weeks, and 30.9 percent had undertaken employer-funded
study or training in the last 12 months.
Most employed people (84.1 percent) were satisfied or very satisfied with all aspects of their main job.
Around three-quarters (75.8 percent) of employed people reported being satisfied or very satisfied with their work-life
balance. Satisfaction with work-life balance decreased as usual hours worked increased.
The Survey of Working Life was a sample survey of employed people in New Zealand and was run as a supplement to the
Household Labour Force Survey in the March 2008 quarter.
Geoff Bascand
Government Statistician
9 December 2008
ENDS
See also the Hot Off The Press information release Survey of Working Life: March 2008 quarter (PDF).