The concept of the weekend, as it is widely understood today, is 100 years old. In 1926, Henry Ford announced that workers at his factories would transition to a five-day, eight-hour work week, rather than six days, with no reduction in pay.
Ford's innovation was partly a response to the exhaustion of workers caused by the assembly line, which had led to absenteeism rates of up to 10%. He also noted that people with more leisure time would require more transportation, which served as a marketing tool for his cars.
In the UK, Boots the Chemist pioneered the five-day week. In 1933, a new factory in Nottingham generated a surplus of stock. To avoid layoffs amid 25% unemployment, John Boot ended the Saturday morning shift for 5,000 staff without cutting wages. This proved commercially successful, reducing absenteeism, and became company policy in 1934.
A government inquiry, led by Richard Redmayne, reviewed the experimental five-day week and noted an improvement in employee stamina and animation due to the physiological and psychological benefits of a longer weekend. The full two-day weekend became widely adopted in the UK after the Second World War.
In contrast, the Soviet Union implemented a system from 1929 to 1940 where citizens were allocated a random day off every seven days, rather than having weekends. This policy aimed to increase productivity by allowing factories to operate continuously, with 80% of the population working daily. However, a letter to Pravda newspaper highlighted problems such as family members having different days off, making shared activities impossible. The policy reportedly led to a demoralised workforce, and the projected productivity increase did not materialise, leading to its eventual abandonment.