In Serbia, nearly 3 million people over the age of 15 were employed in 2023, with the majority—around 2.2 million—working standard weekly hours of 36 to 48 hours, according to the Republic Statistical Office (RZS). However, more than 215,000 employees worked over 48 hours per week, effectively exceeding six workdays.
Standard working hours in Serbia are 40 hours per week—eight hours per day over five days—with legal flexibility allowing up to 12 hours a day in exceptional cases.
The most overtime-prone sectors are agriculture and construction. In agriculture, 14.8% of workers exceed 60 hours a week, while another 13.9% work 49–59 hours. In construction, 18.7% work over 48 hours weekly, with 9.1% logging more than 60 hours.
Conversely, standard working hours are most common in the energy (99.1%), mining (98.3%), public administration (97.4%), healthcare (93.9%), and financial sectors (93.5%).
Gender disparities are notable. Among 1.5 million employed men, 154,000 work over 48 hours per week, including 80,600 who exceed 60 hours. For women, 23,800 work more than 60 hours weekly, and 37,600 work 49–59 hours. About 1 million of the 1.3 million employed women maintain standard hours.
Women dominate among those working less than 36 hours, primarily due to caregiving responsibilities. Family or personal reasons for part-time work are cited by 60.7% of women compared to 39.3% of men. Education or training motivates 56.5% of part-time women and 43.5% of men. In contrast, men are more likely to cite the inability to find full-time work (61.5%) as a reason for shorter hours.
The data, reported by Nova Ekonomija, highlight the persistence of overtime labor and gendered labor patterns in Serbia’s workforce.
