T.G.I.…Thursday?

IT WASN’T LONG AFTER HER COMPANY switched to a four-day workweek that Pilar Meseguer began noticing the benefits. Absenteeism fell nearly 30% at Delsol, the software firm in southern Spain where Meseguer is a deputy director, and satisfaction rates among both her co-workers and customers rose. But there were also some smaller, more personal gains. “I could go to the supermarket on Friday instead of Saturday, when it’s packed with people,” Meseguer says. “It’s a simple thing, but it makes a big difference.”

She may soon have company, including at the market. Earlier this year, the Spanish government agreed to begin a small nationwide trial of a four-day workweek, promising further details in late March. The concept itself is not new; no less an authority than economist John Maynard Keynes famously argued in 1928 that ever increasing efficiency would inevitably free up more leisure time within