Key Small Business Statistics - July 2008

Do the self-employed work longer hours than employees?

The evidence is strong that the self-employed work longer hours than employees; this has been the case since at least 1987. On average, the self-employed worked 41.6 hours per week in 2007 compared with 35.6 hours for employees. Even more striking is the large difference in those who usually worked over 50 hours per week in 2007 – 35 percent of self-employed persons worked over 50 hours compared with less than 5 percent of employees (Figure 9). Clearly, the self-employed usually work longer hours than employees.

Figure 9: Percentage Distribution of Usual Weekly Hours for Employees and the Self-Employed, 1987, 1997 and 2007

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Source: Statistics Canada, Labour Force Survey, April 2008.

When it comes to working part-time (less than 30 hours per week), the self-employed are very similar to employees – 20.2 percent of the self-employed and 17.8 percent of employees worked part-time in 2007. These differences between the self-employed and employees persisted over the 1987–2007 period, although there has been some abatement in the tendency of the self-employed to work over 50 hours per week since 1999. As well, there has been a small rise in the proportion of those working part-time, both among the self-employed and among employees.

As shown in Figure 10, there are also major differences between men and women in usual weekly hours worked – men are more likely to work long hours, whereas women are more likely to work part-time. On average, self-employed men worked 45.3 hours per week in 2007 compared with 34.8 hours for self-employed women. Furthermore, 42.2 percent of self-employed men worked over 50 hours in 2007 compared with 21.3 percent of self-employed women. The same pattern applies among employees, although at much lower levels – 7.1 percent of male employees worked over 50 hours in 2007 compared with 1.8 percent of female employees.

Figure 10: Percentage Distribution of Usual Weekly Hours Worked by Class of Worker and Gender, 2007

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Source: Statistics Canada, Labour Force Survey, April 2008.

Females are more likely to work part-time, whether they are self-employed or are employees. Among the self-employed, 35 percent of women worked part-time (less than 30 hours) in 2007 compared with 12.3 percent of men. Among employees, 25 percent of women worked part-time in 2007 compared with 10.7 percent of men.