You ever read the Baltimore Business Journal? It’s a chronicle of pathos, man—mega-sad stuff going down in Charm City. But here’s that silver lining:

The four-day workweek, once a novel idea to help employees save money on commutes, has now become a concrete tool of survival for many Baltimore-area companies, particularly those tied to the anemic home-building industry.

And for perhaps the first time in its history, Baltimore might be ahead of the curve. Or at least on the curve—the AIA is reporting reduced billable hours nationwide, especially in the south and northeast, while a Watson Wyatt Worldwide survey of 245 companies showed that 13 percent of them reduced workweeks in February. If Baltimore is any measure (as it so often is), a sizable proportion of those companies reducing workweeks could be in the design trade: the brief BBJ piece cites no less than four firms, and the AIA is already fretting over the practice. Sez spokesman Matt Tinder, cutting back to four days is “not really a useful exercise… Not coming into your office is not something the clients are very happy about.”

Could the four-day workweek become the new seven-day workweek? Maybe, but then again Baltimore has always been… different. We’re reminded of the words of the late, great Mr. George Carlin, in character as radio newsman Scott Lame: “It’s eight o’clock in Los Angeles. It’s nine o’clock in Denver. It’s ten o’clock in Chicago. And in Baltimore, it’s six forty-two! Time for the eleven o’clock news…”

Four-Day Workweek Goes from Luxury to Necessity [BBD, via MSNBC]