Who’s Going to Watch the World Cup at Work?

by Joshua Michtom

As you may have heard, the World Cup, which is a competition among nations to determine who has the best soccer team, begins tomorrow, and many people consider it kind of a big deal. The Guardian, which is a newspaper in England, which is a country that both cares much more about soccer than we do and has appreciably more enlightened employment policies, has tips for employees and employers about how to handle the uptick in absences that invariably accompanies the games. Highlights:

While there is no legal requirement for employers to give employees time off to watch World Cup matches, employers should deal with any competing requests fairly, as they would with requests at other periods of high demand (such as Christmas and the summer holidays). For their part, employees are advised to acknowledge that such flexibility might not be possible due to the needs of the business, and even if it was, it would only be a temporary arrangement.

According to a recent survey conducted for YouGov, as many as one in four (25%) of 25–34-year-old men [IN ENGLAND!] said they may take an unauthorised absence when the World Cup kicks off.

The comments are also delightfully British, featuring reminiscences like this one:

I remember watching England vs Brazil at school in 2002 — to reduce the number of us skiving off that morning they put on a breakfast event, so 200 of us showed up to eat bacon sandwiches and then all piled into the assembly hall to watch the match. Just brilliant.

Obviously, none of this advice applies in this country, where the law doesn’t even guarantee that we can get paid time off when we are actually sick, and where we don’t care about soccer nearly so much. In fact, I’m not sure whether the whole Guardian article seems hilarious because of the tacit understanding that of course everyone wants to watch the World Cup or because of the notion that employers might actually deem their employees’ desire to watch a sporting event worthy of consideration.

All of that said, I do like soccer, and I like the World Cup a lot, and I am currently wondering how I will balance work duties (and pesky childcare!) with my strong desire to watch every single match. (Seriously. Even Cote D’Ivoire vs. Japan at 9:00 pm on Saturday.) Obviously, many of us can surreptitiously watch at work: we are blessed to live in an age when all the group round games stream for free on Univision, and the elimination rounds are available streaming to cable subscribers. The problem with that is that some of us (sigh) have to do actual work things at work, and watching soccer makes that hard.

What is your World Cup-watching work situation (assuming you give a damn)? In 2006, I had the good fortune to clerk at an appellate court where the summer workload was light, to the point where many of the judges whom I and my colleagues served didn’t even keep regular hours. Most of these judges gave their clerks permission to decamp to a restaurant across the street twice a day to watch games, so long as all necessary work was completed, cell phones were on, and no alcohol was consumed. I doubt I’ll ever have such a marvelous arrangement again — at least not until I start living off the passive income generated by my investments.

Photo: The Argentinian national team salutes the crowd during a match in 1966. El Gráfico / Wikimedia Commons

Support The Billfold

The Billfold continues to exist thanks to support from our readers. Help us continue to do our work by making a monthly pledge on Patreon or a one-time-only contribution through PayPal.