Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Why Does the Laziest Country in Europe Work the Most?

by Derek Thompson

Atlantic

May 29, 2012

This morning, I posted a funny, sad, and telling chart that revealed that the UK, Germany and Spain consider Greece to be the laziest country in Europe. Greece, on the other hand, voted itself the most industrious nation in the EU.


It turns out that the Greeks are right and the rest of Europe is wrong -- in a way. Greece is the hardest-working country in the EU -- and one of the hardest-working advanced countries in the world -- if you choose to go by OECD's international ranking of average hours worked per person per year, which I've graphed below (with the Y-axis truncated to clarify the comparison):


Now, wait a second. Is Greece the hardest-working country in Europe, or the least-hardworking? How can it be both?

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