Australia's working culture is quietly extracting a staggering cost from its workforce
According to new research from the Centre for Future Work, the average Australian worker logs nearly 3.6 hours of unpaid overtime every week.
This is the equivalent to more than 172 hours annually, or roughly 4.5 full-time work weeks of entirely unpaid labour.
The financial impact is significant. If compensated at median wage rates, that unpaid overtime represents an average loss of $7,930 per worker annually or $305 a fortnight.
Across the economy, this amounts to almost $95.8 billion in lost income, a figure that dwarfs the 2025-26 Commonwealth budget for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and Aged Care Services combined.
A disturbing shift among vulnerable workers
While the government's Right to Disconnect laws, which came into effect in August 2024, appear to be having a stabilising effect on full-time workers' unpaid overtime, a troubling trend has emerged: part-time and casual employees are increasingly working longer unpaid hours.
Full-time employees worked an average of 3.8 hours of unpaid overtime weekly, roughly one hour unpaid for every ten hours paid. But part-time workers, who are already earning less and working fewer paid hours, are logging 3.7 hours of unpaid work per week.
When calculated as a proportion of their paid hours, this represents a far heavier burden: part-time workers effectively give away one hour for every seven they're paid for, while casual workers surrender one hour for every six.
The situation is most acute among young Australians. Workers aged 18 to 24 reported working 4.7 hours of unpaid overtime weekly, nearly one hour unpaid for every five hours worked for pay.
The research reveals why workers are trapped in this cycle of unpaid labour. One in three workers report that unpaid overtime is either expected or encouraged in their workplace.
When asked why they work outside scheduled hours, the most common answer is straightforward: too much work said 41% of respondents.
Staff shortages due to illness or leave were the second most common reason, mentioned by 28%.
Survey respondents noted there is pressure to comply. Among those who work outside scheduled hours, 60% say it's often or always necessary to meet their employer's expectations.
The toll on health and wellbeing
The costs of this unpaid overtime extend far beyond the financial. Workers are paying with their health and personal lives.
More than four in 10 workers reported physical tiredness (42%) and mental exhaustion (37%). Over a third experienced stress or anxiety (35%), while three in ten faced interferences with their personal relationships (31%).
Around a fifth reported disrupted sleep (23%), reduced motivation (21%), and poor job satisfaction (20%).
Yet despite these documented harms, one in five workers report experiencing no negative consequences – a figure that raises questions about normalisation and acceptance of these workplace demands.
A workforce hungry for more work
The research also reveals persistent dissatisfaction with working hours, with 44% claiming they are unhappy with their current hours. Despite this, most want more work, not less.
Thirty percent of workers prefer additional paid hours, driven largely by cost-of-living pressures. This desire is strongest among casual workers (52%) and young people aged 18 to 24 (44%), suggesting that workers are already stretching themselves thin attempting to maintain their standard of living.
Meanwhile, 14% prefer fewer hours, with the most significant preference coming from workers aged 50 to 64. Just 56% say their current hours are "about right."
The polarization of working conditions is stark across industries. In Retail and Hospitality, which operates high-volume, peak-period staffing models, 44% of workers want more paid hours – significantly higher than other sectors.
What workers want
Workers desperately want the ability to disconnect from work. Nearly nine in ten report that leaving work on time (88%), avoiding weekend work interruptions (89%), and not being disturbed while on leave (91%) are very or somewhat important to them.
The stabilisation of unpaid overtime among full-time employees in 2024 and 2025 suggests that the Right to Disconnect laws may be having their intended effect.
However, the growth of unpaid overtime among part-time and casual workers indicates these protections haven't yet reached those most vulnerable to exploitation.
With business models increasingly relying on flexible "just-in-time" workforces, facilitated by AI-driven rostering, the pressure on casual and part-time workers to log extra hours without extra pay shows no signs of slowing.
The research raises an uncomfortable question for Australian employers and policymakers: if workers are giving away the equivalent of 4.5 full work weeks every year, and paying such a steep price in health and wellbeing, is the current model of work sustainable?
Or is Australia building a workforce that's increasingly exhausted, underemployed yet overworked, and financially stressed despite putting in far more time than their payslips reflect?
