As we rang in the New Year, France passed a law stating that companies employing more than fifty people should set up specific hours when their employees have the ‘right to disconnect’. During these hours, employees are not obligated to check their work emails during the specified time frame–usually nights and weekends. This law, along with many others passed on January 1, has created a great amount of controversy across the globe. Members of the French parliament who have supported this law argue that it will increase worker productivity and that employees will be less likely to burn out when allowed ample time to socialize and spend time with family.

“All the studies show there is far more work-related stress today than there used to be, and that the stress is constant,” Parliament member Benoit Hamon told BBC News. “The texts, the messages, the emails – they colonise the life of the individual to the point where he or she eventually breaks down.”

These breakdowns, primarily caused by excessive stress, can lead to lack of productivity in the workplace and, in some cases, mental health issues that could further inhibit one’s ability to do their work. French citizens should be allowed to disconnect based on their personal lives, mental health, and stress levels, but it seems unfair to completely bar employees from email servers and company-owned technology.

“Employees are more and more connected during hours outside of the office,” the minister of labor, Myriam El Khomri, told The New York Times. “The boundary between professional and personal life has become tenuous.”

As lawmakers continue to support the ‘right to disconnect’ with statements like Khomri’s, some companies and their employees aren’t as quick to hop on board with the law.

Gregory, a software writer in France, told BBC News, “In my company, we compete with Indian, Chinese, American developers. We need to talk to people around the world late into the night. Our competitors don’t have the same restrictions. If we obeyed this law we would just be shooting ourselves in the foot.”

This law has very recently been set in place in France, but it is possible that if the ‘right to disconnect’ proves helpful there, it could be adopted here in the United States. If employees could no longer check their work email after hours in the United States, then it is very possible that teachers could not answer student emails, perhaps regarding assignments due the next day or important tests, solely based on the fact that those emails were sent and received after hours.

As time goes on and the ‘right to disconnect’ becomes more widespread it will be interesting to see how the law might be changed to accommodate France’s employees and specific company needs. However, these French companies are competing with other international corporations that have alternate standards and are operating in different time zones. It doesn’t seem fair to workers to keep the law as it is currently, barring them from using work email after hours.