The impending four-day workweek will bring new questions of productivity, output, and outcomes. AI is the answer, this future-of-work strategist says. The amount of time people spend “at work” has changed significantly over the last few centuries. Robert Whaples, a professor of economics at Wake Forest University has mapped out the history of hours of work in the U.S., which reveals a gradual decline from working “first light to dark” (70+ hours a week) to the passing of the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, which eventually established the 40-hour workweek.