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<h1 id="reader-title">Temer's Holiday Gift to Brazilian Workers:
More Work, Less Pay</h1>
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<p>December 22, 2016<br>
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<p>Brazilian senate-imposed president Michel Temer
announced Thursday a labor reform that expands workdays
from 8 to 12 hours, cutting lunch time to half an hour
and reducing holidays.</p>
<p>The project will increase workload but won't increase
overtime pay, and will stay under the limit of 44 hours
per week and 220 hours per month. The bill will also
limit the time given to workers for lunch to just half
an hour instead of an hour and will cut back on days off
for holidays.</p>
<p>As Temer announced the reform, that will need to be
approved by the lower house of congress, he said that
this proposal was a "beautiful Christmas present."</p>
<p>"I hope that starting from this Christmas it will be
possible to unite all Brazilians," said Temer.</p>
<p>Temporary contracts, with less benefits and securities
than regular contracts, which are currently up to 90
days will be expanded to 120 days. These contracts could
potentially be approved indefinitely.</p>
<p>Contracts under the country's "Safe Job" program will
include a wage reduction of 30 percent and less working
hours to avoid layoffs. The bill also proposes that
vacations be divided into three different periods,
instead of only one vacation period.</p>
<p>This labor reform is one of the three austerity
economic proposals by the coup-imposed government of
Michel Temer. The first was the approval of the
constitutional reform, PEC 55 which limits the public
spending in social programs for the next 20 years, and
the second is the pension system reform which is
currently under discussion in Brazil's lower house.</p>
<p>Temer said that although his measures are unpopular,
and he is strongly criticized in Brazil, he will not
resign, not even after the recent scandals involving him
and members of his cabinet in the corruption scheme
inside the state-run oil company Petrobras.</p>
<p>A recent poll by the Brazilian Institute of Opinion,
Ibope, published last Friday, revealed that 46 percent
of Brazilians think that the government of Michel Temer
is "bad" or "extremely bad."</p>
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