GREECE AND WORLD: Who works the longest hours in Europe?

Who'd working the longest hours in Europe? Photograph: Alamy

UPDATE: this now includes productivity figures for each country, too

As Europe's leaders gather to discuss how to rescue the mediterranean economies and safeguard the single currency, it's tempting to resort to crude national stereotypes of prudent, hard-working Germans and lazy Greeks.

But the Office for National Statistics seems to be on a mission to rescue us from our own prejudices. New data published this morning shows that Greek workers actually put in longer hours than anyone else in Europe — 42.2 per week, compared to just 35.6 in Germany. If you look at full-time figures, it is even starker.

Data summary

EU working hours

Click heading to sort table. Download this data
Country	All in employment	Full-time employment	Productivity index per hour worked (EU=100)
SOURCE: ONS
EU	37.4	41.6	100
Austria	37.8	43.7	115
Belgium	36.9	41.7	134.7
Bulgaria	40.9	41.3	41.7
Cyprus	40	42.1	80
Czech Republic	41.2	42.3	70.1
Denmark	33.8	39.1	119.2
Estonia	38.6	40.8	61.1
Finland	37.4	40.3	111.3
France	38	41.1	132.7
Germany	35.6	42	123.7
Greece	42.2	43.7	76.3
Hungary	39.4	40.6	59.2
Ireland	35	39.7	125.6
Italy	37.6	40.5	101.5
Latvia	39.2	40.8	47.1
Lithuania	38.3	39.7	55.7
Luxembourg	37	40.5	189.2
Malta	38.8	41.4	81.9
Netherlands	30.5	40.9	136.5
Poland	40.6	42.2	53.9
Portugal	39.1	42.3	65.4
Romania	40.5	41	41.7
Slovakia	40.5	41.5	78.4
Slovenia	39.6	41.8	80.2
Spain	38.4	41.6	107.9
Sweden	36.5	40.9	115.5
UK	36.3	42.7	107.2