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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

#111

Post by alkonaut »

ArlenBales wrote: post #108
alkonaut wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd much rather do 5x6h, I suppose the difference might be if you have small children.

You're probably right, if I did have kids I would prefer 5x6h until I shed that responsibility (they leave the house once adults). But as someone without kids, being able to take short flights or trips every week over 3 days would be awesome. I guess ideally, since 5x6h and 4x8h are only two hours apart, a utopian workplace would offer its employees either option -- the people who chose 4x8h would make 2h more wages…

I do 40 flexible hours already, so I do a couple of hours in the evening or on the weekend, just to get a 6-7h typical day, to fit the schedule with school pickup etc.

If I wanted, I could work 4x10 (With some sweet talking to a manager perhaps). I'd very much prefer to have 30, 32 or 35h to distribute over the week though, it would make the planning a lot easier. In that case I'd do e.g. 5x6 now that my small children needs early pickup, but I'd go to 4x8 when I have larger children who can bike home from school, so we can go on a weekend trip with friday off.

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

#112

Post by douche »

I still miss the days when I was working in a power plant and worked a 40-hour week, over four days. Especially since the schedule was arranged so that the off-days were staggered to produce a four-day weekend every other week.

The only downside was, ironically, on holiday weeks, because the holiday pay was only 8 hours, which resulted in still having to work four shorter days, and often screwing up a long-weekend cycle.

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

#113

Post by guntars »

wlll wrote: post #62

My own really short story, I (sysadmin/ops/programmer) currently work remotely about 4 hours per day, and I'm way more productive than when I worked 8.

Do you mind expanding on why that is? I hear this often and I'd like it to be true, but I find it hard to believe.

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

#114

Post by scrollaway »

nitrogen wrote: post #110
scrollaway wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

I'd advise caution. Last time I did the same I lost the ability to vouch. Responding to the comment itself: the idea behind reduced workweeks is that some jobs become more productive with fewer hours worked. But those are probably all white collar jobs. I'd say there's something deeply, fundamentally broken in a society if the very thought of people being able to live while working less seems so anathema.

> Last time I did the same I lost the ability to vouch.

Shoot an email to the mods, I'm sure they'll restore it.

Looking at rebootthesystem's previous comments, a couple are a bit heated but in general it's decent quality. I've made worse comments than that one without getting flagged myself; assuming good faith goes a long way.

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

#115

Post by loup-vaillant »

Something in those numbers doesn't add up. I gather they maintained the salaries. Good. They had to hire more people, at a cost of 12 million kronor. This mechanically reduced unemployment, and saved the state 4.7 million kronor. Shall I deduce the unemployed people were paid 40% less than the salary they got? Something is wrong there: in France, unemployment insurance maintains 75% of the base salary. Saving only 40% looks quite low.

I need a more detailed analysis. If generalised, this would significantly reduce unemployment. We could thus lower the unemployment insurance rates. I've seen predictions this basically balances out: we can sustain the current effective salaries at no cost.

The way this is presented here, this theory appears to be false. Does it? I'm sure we can draw a more definite answer, but this article is not enough.

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

#116

Post by kodt »

ArlenBales wrote: post #108
alkonaut wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd much rather do 5x6h, I suppose the difference might be if you have small children.

You're probably right, if I did have kids I would prefer 5x6h until I shed that responsibility (they leave the house once adults). But as someone without kids, being able to take short flights or trips every week over 3 days would be awesome. I guess ideally, since 5x6h and 4x8h are only two hours apart, a utopian workplace would offer its employees either option -- the people who chose 4x8h would make 2h more wages…

Having a 4 day work week would mean one day off without kids (they are in school/sitter/day-care) which would be great and would give you tons more freedom just to get things done. Either chores around the house, need to take the car to the shop, visit the DMV, any number of things that are extremely difficult and busy on a Saturday with kids.

Of course, if everyone works 4 days a week and has the same 5th day off that advantage goes away I suppose.

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

#117

Post by vacri »

Johnny555 wrote: post #109
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 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 in pay. While a 25% pay cut sounds extreme, my wife took a 20% pay cut to work a 4 day week and she's never been happier. She has more time to do the th…

There's definitely a difference in the pay packets between skilled workers and minimum wagers. Folks on a decent salary can definitely afford to trade some money for time.

The flip side of the coin is that the better-paying jobs tend to also be more enjoyable than the scrub jobs. I love my current job as a sysadmin, and am happy to work a full week, but back when I was on phone support, I would have loved to have carved a day off if I could have lived on the remainder...

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

#118

Post by squozzer »

Johnny555 wrote: post #109
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 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 in pay. While a 25% pay cut sounds extreme, my wife took a 20% pay cut to work a 4 day week and she's never been happier. She has more time to do the th…

Which I think leads us to a reasonable question, perhaps appropriate for a phase 2 implementation -- did anyone ASK the nurses if they would take a 25% pay cut?

Not wanting to play Masters Of The Universe with Swedish nurses or anything, but wouldn't it be possible for Gothenburg to have two nursing homes, one with 6-hour shifts and the other with 8? Set pay on an hourly scale. Then see who goes where.

But getting to the 25% pay cut point, we should at least acknowledge that tinkering with work weeks will have repercussions, some predictable (e.g. will teachers benefit?) and some not.

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

#119

Post by marxama »

ArlenBales wrote: post #100

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.…

Agreed. Especially when taking commuting into account - for me, one day off means 2 hours less commuting.

During the past year, I've actually started trying this out. I've taken a couple of my vacation weeks and spread them out - instead of taking one week vacation, I've taken Fridays off for five weeks. It's been amazing. Somehow it feels like that extra day counts twice: your weekend gets one day longer, and your work week gets one day shorter!

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

#120

Post by ncallaway »

RandomOpinion wrote: post #33
simonebrunozzi wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm more curious to see the results of Amazon's 30 hr work week because I believe that includes developers. I hope you're joking, otherwise you don't know Amazon at all. (source: I worked at AWS for six years)

I believe he's referring to Amazon's pilot program for part-time employees doing 30 hour workweeks: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/08/26...

Funny to see this now. I left Amazon about 3 years ago, because there was no career path advancement for fewer hours.

I would've stayed at Amazon longer if at the end of the year instead of paying me more money they would've been willing to just make me work fewer hours.

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