The balance between work and life is deteriorating for four in 10 people, according to a new study which also found Australians are donating $110 billion in free labour each year.

Job insecurity and an expectation from bosses that employees will work longer hours are the reasons why people are doing more overtime.

The average full-time worker is doing six hours of unpaid overtime each week worth an estimated $9471 a year, according to a report to be released on Wednesday by The Australia Institute think tank.

Executive director Richard Denniss said many Australians were giving their valuable time freely to organisations that are legally obliged to pay for it.

"Whether they realise it or not Australians are far more generous to their employer than they are to any charity," he said.

The survey of close to 1000 people around the country found 46 per cent of people are expected to work longer hours and 27 per cent said their position had become insecure.

Director of Research, David Baker, said fear about job security was widespread.

"For many Australian workers rocking the boat appears to be a genuine concern," Mr Baker said. "If seeking better balance is perceived to be a threat to career prospects people are unlikely to freely raise the issue with their boss," Mr Baker said.

Most people said they were willing to get more flexible work hours and fixed finishing times to improve their work/life balance, but three quarters said they were unwilling to reduce their pay

Dr Denniss said the study suggested it was not enough to raise awareness among workers about the need for work/life balance.

"It's time that employers and industry groups started to talk about how they are going to tackle this problem. It's time that governments took this problem a lot more seriously.

"A simple thing they could do is require all large companies to survey their employees each year on work/life balance and publish those surveys on their websites."

 

Rob Breaden, a national sales manager for a training and consulting company said the phones at his office automatically switched over to voice mail at 5pm to prevent people from working overtime.

"If you phone us at one minute past five you won't get us," he said.

"We allow people to work from home, but it is a rule you can't send anyone an email after 5pm.

"When people go on holiday, we disable their email so they don't monitor it while they are away. We want them to have a complete break."

 

Mr Breaden said his training organisation helped companies become more productive, with a focus on work/life balance.

He said people tended to skip lunch and work back late or start early because they found it was their most productive time at work when there were fewer distractions.

"We encourage people to have one hour of uninterrupted time at work. This improves productivity," he said.

 

Mr Breaden said longer working hours were contributing to higher levels of depression and anxiety. He said bosses in some European countries were outlawed from asking employees to work overtime.

"Australia behind the eight ball in providing mentally healthy workplaces," he said.