According to figures from Coe-Rexecode, a private French research institute, Finns who are employed full time in steady jobs work only 1,670 hours a year. The French spend nine more hours on the job annually. In Sweden, the figure is 1,719 hours, which is also below the EU average.
At 2,095 a year, Romanians clock the most hours, with Hungarians in second place. Germans, on average, spend 1,904 hours a year at work.
The results from Coe-Rexecode are based on basic figures for 2010 published by the European statistical centre Eurostat.
However, the original Eurostat statistics do not reflect the actual time employees spend at work, as they do not include a deduction of hours for sick leaves, parental leaves or other reasons for being away from work. Researchers at Coe-Rexecode also re-classed figures to separate statistics for full time employees from those for part-time employees and entrepreneurs.