Mexico’s Workweek Reform Leaves Door Open to 56 Hour Workweeks

ByGerardo Hernández

This article by Gerardo Hernández originally appeared in the March 23, 2026 edition of El Economista.

The constitutional reform to reduce the working day left the door open for employers and workers to agree on 56-hour weeks, by adding the new limits on overtime and triple hours, said Fernando Yllanes Almanza, managing partner of Consulting at the firm Yllanes Ramos.

“Today we have the same definition, overtime can only be carried out in extraordinary circumstances and even then there is the capacity to have it structurally because we do not have a legal prohibition or the Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare (STPS) does not sanction for it,” he pointed out.

During the Assembly of the Association of Human Resources of the Petroleum Industry (ARHIP), the labour lawyer explained that once the 40-hour work week is implemented, the workday may be longer as long as the new limits established are not exceeded and the corresponding payment is made.

This wouldn’t break with either the spirit of the reform or the position of the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS), opined Fernando Yllanes Almanza. “It’s part of how the authorities will carry out inspections; they’re presenting it as an economic victory for workers. It should be part of our planning objectives to define when people will earn more money because it’s considered overtime. If we do it the other way around, and what we try to do is manipulate the system to pay less per overtime hour, then we’ll run into problems.”

The shortage of skilled labour and the operational costs of implementing the reform make this scenario possible: workdays exceeding 40 hours in a structured manner, provided it is agreed with the workers and the corresponding payment is made.

While it’s necessary to analyze each case individually, the other side of the coin is that the workers themselves are happy to have overtime to earn more money. “That has been the government’s rallying cry; the Secretary of Labour himself, when he announced (the reform), said, ‘People are going to be better off, they’re going to earn more. Before, they only earned 9 hours, now they’re going to earn 16.’ The Labour Ministry’s rallying cry is that people are going to earn more money,” he added.

The work schedule reform enacted this month amended the Constitution to establish a limit of 40 hours per week, with a gradual transition starting on January 1, 2027. Subsequently, two hours will be reduced annually on the first day of each year until the new weekly limit is reached, which will occur in 2030.

The amendments to the Magna Carta also include a new limit on overtime, which will increase from 9 to 12 hours allowed per week, and puts a cap on so-called ‘triple hours’, which cannot exceed 4 hours in the weekly count.

40-hour Workweek: Now a Roadmap for Preparation

Although changes to the Federal Labour Law (LFT) are still pending, the constitutional reform already offers a compass for companies to begin preparing for the transition.

“The secondary reform will no longer make changes to that, and that is the legal certainty we can use to start organizing operations and plans, because otherwise, if we wait for the legal reform, there are still challenges we have to overcome,” said Fernando Yllanes Almanza.

With the provisions already contained in the Constitution, the specialist pointed out, companies can begin now with their work plans for the implementation of the new legal limits.