We propose a type system to analyze the time consumed by multi-threaded
imperative programs with a shared global memory, which delineates a class of
safe multi-threaded programs. We demonstrate that a safe multi-threaded program
runs in polynomial time if (i) it is strongly terminating wrt a
non-deterministic scheduling policy or (ii) it terminates wrt a deterministic
and quiet scheduling policy. As a consequence, we also characterize the set of
polynomial time functions. The type system presented is based on the
fundamental notion of data tiering, which is central in implicit computational
complexity. It regulates the information flow in a computation. This aspect is
interesting in that the type system bears a resemblance to typed based
information flow analysis and notions of non-interference. As far as we know,
this is the first characterization by a type system of polynomial time
multi-threaded programs