A new research by Australia Institute revealed the nature and extent of overtime work in Australia.

Some of the highlights of the research:

• A typical full-time employee works 70 minutes of unpaid overtime a day, amounting to 2.14 billion hours annually and gifting $72 billion to employers.
• Full-time employees work more unpaid overtime then anyone else (table 2)
• 50% of white-collared workers experienced unpaid overtime, compared to 24.2% for blue collared workers. (table 2)
• Male employees (49.7%) worked more unpaid overtime than their female counterparts (41%)
• Older and high-income earners work more unpaid overtime (table 5)
• Workplace culture is a contributing factor with 44% who work unpaid overtime saying that it is ‘compulsory’ or ‘expected’ (table 6)

What’s interesting is the fact that majority of workers (63.4%) would choose to work overtime because they have a strong sense of commitment and duty to their job (table 8).  In other words, many Australians are happy to work overtime without getting paid. Most companies focus a lot on remuneration to motivate staff, perhaps altruism is underestimated.

The report (pdf) is a worthy read.