Get bent, Brenda
Get bent, Brenda
30 is common, but I wouldn’t say standard. An hour a day feels standard.
In office work, you usually get it all in one chunk, whereas if you work physically demanding or shift-based work, you get 15 minutes coffee break, then at lunch 30 minutes, then another 15 minutes later. This is true at least for all the western European countries.
In Germany it’s dependent on the work hours and type of physical activity, for me it’s: <6 hours, no break (for adults) 6-8 hours, 30 minutes break 8-10 hours, 45 minutes break
10 hours, 1 hour
if you have a job where you have to concentrate a lot (assembly lines, bus/truck drivers, air traffic controllers) these times change a lot, sometimes down to like 1 hour maximum continuous work and then 15-30 minutes of break time.
At least in Finland the 30 minutes is meant to be 30 minutes sitting down and eating your food. If your place of work has a shared cafeteria people are meant to eat lunch in, getting from your desk to the cafeteria and back, and queueing for your food aren’t meant to be part of the lunch break. Only the part you actually spend eating and thus properly on a break.
It’s a bit of a spirit of the law thing, though the law is quite exact on the matter. Good luck trying to find an employer outside desk jobs who actually abide by it, though, as factory jobs are scheduled around 20 or 30 minute breaks and if you’re not back at your line by then, production halts. Luckily that fact is typically compensated in the pay.
I’d assume other European countries with 30 minute lunch have a similar clause.