Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week • Hacker News Board

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#41

Post by MaysonL » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:34 PM UTC

tome wrote: post #22

veidr wrote: post #9

TL;DR: you can get more done if you work 60 hours instead of 40 hours in a week, but the work done in that extra 20 hours might be a small fraction of what gets done in 20 hours during a 40 hour week. This is self-evidently true for many jobs. E.g., if you pick apples for 40 hours, then even if you only pick one apple per hour after that, you will still pick more apples working 50 hours than 40. We software developer…

Is this really so? Perhaps in the long term 40-hour-a-week pickers pick more than 60-hour-a-week pickers in absolute terms simply because the extra recovery time helps them be fitter and have more energy.

Apple picking is like crunch time – or at least like crunch time should be – it's not a long-term activity: the time between apples ripening and the first frost ruining them is not long.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#42

Post by WisNorCan » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:36 PM UTC

"If you are managing as a group, go for the average"

This is a point I strongly disagree with. Just the way some people need fewer hours of sleep than others OR some people can run further than others. I have found that people have vastly different ability to focus and personal drive.

Orienting around averages is a terrible way to develop a team and people. It also demotivates people that want to work harder and they end up leaving. Instead of setting an average, create an environment where people can push harder if they want to AND get incremental rewards.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#43

Post by AndrewKemendo » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:37 PM UTC

dheera wrote: post #36

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #19

I love how things like the 40 hour work week with two days off get enshrined as some kind of natural phenomenon that has always been with us. 40 hours is an arbitrary number that came from trade unionists demanding fair hours and Robert Owen's slogan: “Eight hours labour, eight hours recreation, eight hours rest.” I mean those two things: 8 hour work day and 8 hours of sleep have been considered to be the biological/…

It's actually flawed because there are other things that need to be done in a week besides work, recreation, and rest. For example: - eating: 12-15 hours/week - making food (or travelling to get food): 7-10 hours/week - showering, shaving, grooming: 4-7 hours/week - laundry, cleaning, house chores: 2-4 hours/week - commuting: 5-10 hours/week - waiting in line (checkout lines, customer service reps, Comcast/DMV/insura…

Right, it was a completely different world when the 40 hour work week was proposed and people were pretty interchangeable in the industrializing shift.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#44

Post by jimnotgym » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:38 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #10

jimnotgym wrote: post #7

A bit surprised not to see a reference to Henry Ford. I thought he was the father of the 40 hour work week? He did include in his thinking the idea that more leisure time would allow workers more time to enjoy his cars, but IIRC the basis of the change was not social, but productivity, and based on his own studies.

The 40-hour workweek was conceived of and fought for by many socialists and labor activists over many years. What can be said for Ford is that they instituted it without being forced to (by strike or law), but it was nearly 50 years after it had been instituted for federal employees (and 2 years after it was a part of FDR's platform.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-hour_day#United_States

I wonder which had the biggest effect on its widespread adoption, Ford on the unions. I'm sure I read that once Ford did it, it became almost fasionable in the factory owning classes!

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#45

Post by conanbatt » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:40 PM UTC

veidr wrote: post #9

TL;DR: you can get more done if you work 60 hours instead of 40 hours in a week, but the work done in that extra 20 hours might be a small fraction of what gets done in 20 hours during a 40 hour week. This is self-evidently true for many jobs. E.g., if you pick apples for 40 hours, then even if you only pick one apple per hour after that, you will still pick more apples working 50 hours than 40. We software developer…

I doubt that the bugs provoked by tiredness have an aggregate of negative productivity.

And even if so, it can be mitigated. As a webdeveloper, when Im tired i do the most menial tasks which means that bugs introduced there are rare and not important.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#46

Post by rb808 » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:45 PM UTC

Does this include side projects? ie if you work 10 hours/week on a side project you shouldn't work more than 30 in your job.

Maybe employers should be able to ban side projects for this reason.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#47

Post by kilroy123 » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:45 PM UTC

dheera wrote: post #23

I wonder how they got this curve. A lot of things can be sustained for 1 week cannot be sustained in the long term. I'd say in the long term: * 140-168 hours/week --> almost certain death. * 100-140 hours/week --> at risk of cardiovascular disease and many other serious medical conditions. Possible early death. * 80-100 hours/week --> still super-bad for your body. Forget raising children, dating, getting married, or…

What about these?

* 30-40 hours

* 20-30 hours

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#48

Post by tobych » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:46 PM UTC

jbmorgado wrote: post #12

This title is very odd, I suggest an edit: Research is unable to prove that working more than 40 hours a week increases productivity.

Yes, coming from the UK, where my hours in academia were 37.5/week, I was surprised to learn (from my incorrect interpretation of the title) that those 2.5 hours/week I work here in the US were pointless.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#49

Post by heisenbit » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:47 PM UTC

Ability to perform is in part a function of age which the article leaves out completely. 40h/week is doable for most but there are plenty of posts by more experienced developers here who have said they strictly limit hours or report that when they were younger they were able to perform longer.

There is also the question of sustainability. Not only health wise but also the social system around one gets impacted imho. somewhere beyond 45-50h. More work directed output may well be possible but at the cost of weakening the support system and with that increased risk in times of crisis.

I'm willing to discuss this more in depth with the author once he's got a few grey hairs.

Re: Research does not say that people produce more when working 40 hours per week

#50

Post by the_cat_kittles » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 4:48 PM UTC

jonas21 wrote: post #21

veidr wrote: post #9

TL;DR: you can get more done if you work 60 hours instead of 40 hours in a week, but the work done in that extra 20 hours might be a small fraction of what gets done in 20 hours during a 40 hour week. This is self-evidently true for many jobs. E.g., if you pick apples for 40 hours, then even if you only pick one apple per hour after that, you will still pick more apples working 50 hours than 40. We software developer…

I think you might be missing the author's last point which is that in a competitive field, even a small increase in output can lead to a large increase in payoff. In his example of getting research funding, it's a step function: either you get funded (y=1) or you don't (y=0), and because you're competing with others, even a small output increase can take you from the 0 side to the 1 side.

i've never thought about how these two things relate to each other: asymptotic productivity of work, and winner take almost all nature of capitalism. seems like a very succinct way of explaining why people work so damned much. i'm actually kind of embarrassed i've never connected the two. it seems to make the argument against it more clear too- if marginal hours worked grow less productive, and marginal improvement to the product is negligible in every day terms, we ought to mitigate that somehow, unless its something people are doing because they love it.