This week’s edition of Upside looks at experimental projects that offer a peek into the future

Should we be working less, and how safe is going cash-free?

New technologies are often touted as the solutions to our problems, as well as decried as the cause of all manner of social ills. We are told that increasing automation of jobs will mean more of us spending less time working, with ever greater responsibility handed over to software, sensors and the cloud.

This week we visited some experimental projects that could offer a glimpse of our future, to see how people are grappling with the possibilities and problems of technological innovation.

Reducing our working hours, while ensuring sufficient pay and essential services, is often floated as the best model for boosting productivity. It is also a seemingly inevitable byproduct of the rise of the robot worker.

In New Zealand, our reporter Eleanor Ainge Roy visited a company trialling a four-day work week while still paying its employees the same, an experiment that is being closely watched around the world. Did employees and management agree on how it was going?

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Shops and cafes in Sweden increasingly refuse to accept cash Photograph: Maskot/Getty Images/Maskot

Digital payment systems have long been promoted as a cheaper, safer alternative to cash. Physical money creates logistical expense and security risks for individuals and businesses, while its anonymity can be exploited by criminals operating on a larger scale. Sweden has enthusiastically embraced a world without cash, with merchants increasingly refusing to accept physical money.

But a small but growing group of Swedes are raising the alarm about the implications of going fully cash-free, as David Crouch discovered.



In England, where the number of rough sleepers has risen 169% in the past decade, Rachel Obordo visited startups that are harnessing the power of digital crowdfunding platforms to give homeless people a chance to rebuild their lives.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Tarquin, Jordan, Hana and Tony from Beam, a startup harnessing crowdfunding to help homeless people get back to work. Photograph: Jill Mead/The Guardian

What we liked:

This deep dive by the Arizona Daily Star on the causes of and solutions to Arizona’s “foster care crisis”, and this New York Times report on a progressive approach to tackling violence.

Also in the Times, this comparison of how different countries handle student debt was enlightening. And we enjoyed this interview with Africa Check’s deputy editor about fact-checking and fake news.

What we heard:

44 hour weeks might have been OK when you could go home and your spouse has done the housework and cooked the meals etc but now that both partners usually work, they have to get home and do all the housework and the kids and the meals, and it’s too stressful. Commenter Canprof writing below the line about four-day work weeks

Where was the upside?

In Mumbai, where a mass cleanup of Versova beach led to hatchlings from a vulnerable turtle species appearing for the first time in decades. And in the Pantanal, the world’s largest tropical wetland, which spreads into Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay. The three countries signed a declaration agreeing to protect the area.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Volunteers in Mumbai keep watch over the tiny hatchlings to ward off predators as they enter the sea. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

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If there is a story, innovation or everyday hero you think we should report on, write to us at theupside@theguardian.com