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Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

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Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#91

Post by fetbaffe »

marzell wrote: post #90
fetbaffe wrote: post #77

This pilot was actually not 6-hour workday, but 30 hour workweek. Yes, it is true that the politicians that decided it called it for 6-hour workday, but in reality is was 30 hour workweek and nothing else, because of how the facility works with scheduling and so on (regulations etc). Nurses worked between 5 to 7 hours on day shifts resulting in a 30 hour workweek. Night shifts was 6 to 8 hours. I think it is importan…

Seeing as how even the PDF you link says in the first sentence "6-hour workday" ("6 timmars arbetsdag"), I can see why there is some confusion about the specific details.

Yes, that does not really help. That shows that it is important for journalists to read the fine print.

In Sweden, 6-hour workday is a well known political slogan, probably why that was used.

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#92

Post by falcolas »

tdb7893 wrote: post #67
falcolas wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The costs are not trivial, I agree. But neither are the stated benefits. I personally value those benefits, even at a 10% premium.

I personally would be willing to have a 10% pay cut to work only 6 hours a day

Unfortunately, at least in the US, going down to 6 hours a day makes you a part time employee, at which point you lose a lot more than even 25% of your pay. Frequently benefits are pared down to the point of extinction, including health, vacation and holidays.

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#93

Post by jinfiesto »

This was a bad industry in which to pilot this. There are obviously hard time requirements in terms of when such a facility has to be staffed. Obviously, cutting everone's hours means that other people will have to be hired to pick up the slack. It's hard to believe that no one saw this coming. I'd be more interested in seeing the impact of a 6-hour working day on a business that doesn't function in this way.

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#94

Post by sdfjn23k »

poooogles wrote: post #82
crististm wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm commenting on rebootthesystem comment which is flagged and dead. I don't understand why - he makes a perfectly valid and coherent point.

The language used in his comment has no place on Hacker News [1]. 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

so much bullshit.

I've seen accounts disabled because they posted 'generic' views. That's nowhere in your bullsit mod policy.

Fuck mods

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#95

Post by dang »

fetbaffe wrote: post #77

This pilot was actually not 6-hour workday, but 30 hour workweek. Yes, it is true that the politicians that decided it called it for 6-hour workday, but in reality is was 30 hour workweek and nothing else, because of how the facility works with scheduling and so on (regulations etc). Nurses worked between 5 to 7 hours on day shifts resulting in a 30 hour workweek. Night shifts was 6 to 8 hours. I think it is importan…

OK, we put "30 hour work week" in the title instead. Thanks!

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#96

Post by dang »

Url changed from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/sweden-six-h..., which points to this.

Submitters: please don't submit an article that's clearly lifted from another publicly available source. Submit the latter instead. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#97

Post by Declanomous »

rogerdpack wrote: post #84
Declanomous wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I like Google's version, where you can work on personal projects. You are still around if people need you, but you can work on other things as well rather than burning out trying to work on one thing for 40+ hours a week.

I heard once anecdotally that google side projects are sometimes "supposed to be work related" so not quite as free as you'd imagine, FWIW...or perhaps they're not dunno never worked there.

I think they are supposed to be work related, but that's still a change of pace. There are things I want to fix at my job that will never be fixed because it isn't anybody's job, and nobody would let you mess around with it because it would be circumventing the normal decision making process. It would be really nice to just say "I'm just trying something out," without needing to schedule an hour-long meeting with 8 people to create a roadmap.

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#98

Post by scarecrowbob »

rogerdpack wrote: post #79
scarecrowbob wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So here's a question that I continually ask myself as I work at my remote, salaried 6-hour-a-day developer job that I've been doing for the last year: how do I know how much work is enough? If I gauge by productivity, that's cool... I'll just be really fast and get my stuff done and then go play banjo or whatever. But then when folks hand me a crufty WordPress site that is misbehaving and it could be anything between…

Did you negotiate the 6-hour-day up front or just...uh...you know...work 6 hours, as it were?

I started out as an hourly contractor doing projects for a really good salesperson, and then she bought all my time that I cared to sell (about 30 hours a week), and then we formalized it as a w2 position about 10 months ago.

It's a very small company with doing web dev projects; there's only the boss (who pretty much just does sales), the "Design Dept. Head" out in SF, the "Chief Project Manager" in Az, and me (I'm an hour outside of Austin), plus a couple of off and on freelancers.

TBH, the expectation is mostly that "we get stuff done"; for example I had to meet with a client for a sub-contracted NSF gig on our NYE holiday. Or I have had to fix broken stuff in the middle of the night/ work late to make some magic happen occasionally. That has been rare enough so that, like the once or twice a year I have to travel, it's novel and kind of fun.

But between the limited sales pipeline, higher-margin clientele, and being fairly efficient the formal office hours that I agreed to are easy to maintain.

I play a lot of music, and I suspect that it's very much like being in a successful band would be like (I wouldn't know specifically what that is like, though, I only gig on the weekends at bars).

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#99

Post by scrollaway »

rebootthesystem wrote: post #58

> In a perfect situation this would have led to higher employment numbers and happier employees. What kind of hippie logic is this? Happier employees? I don't know ANYONE who would be happier if they got a 25% pay cut except for, maybe, single hippies who want to smoke dope all day and have no responsibilities. The average person, on the other hand, and particularly those with kids, would be devastated by a 25% cut i…

I'm vouching this comment because you're bringing a valid point into the discussion but you need to tone the hostility down.

Re: Sweden reveals results from pilot of 30-hour work week

#100

Post by ArlenBales »

My utopian society workweek is 4 days/8 hours.

That extra day off would do far more for people than one or two less hours every day. So 4x8=32 hours, vs 6x5=30 hours. I would even bargain for 4 days/9 hours, or 4x9=36 hours.

That third day is huge. It's the difference from having only enough time for some leisurely weekend activities, to having enough time to take a mini-3-day-vacation every week (short flights, etc.).

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