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More bosses give four-day workweek a try

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Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#311

Post by xxandroxygen »

wasdfff wrote: post #210
mortenjorck wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm genuinely impressed that the Overton window on hours seems to have changed since the last time the 4-day work week was in the headlines. Not that long ago, it was unquestioned that four days meant 4x10. It was simply unthinkable that we would consider less than forty hours "full time." I even skipped this article initially, expecting it to have the same assumptions! And yet, they specifically report that Shake Sh…

Service sector does not want you working 40 hours a week for benefits purposes.

But 32 hours is enough to qualify for benefits.

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#312

Post by stitched2gethr »

I would love to go to a 32 hour work week, but not for the obvious reason. I would still put in 50 hours but it would give me more of an edge over everyone else. I don't feel like I'm in direct competition with my peers, but I always hold myself to a sometimes unreasonable standard for what I "feel I should be getting done," and I use those around me as a ruler. I always just want to be better, and especially faster, but without losing the clean thought process. For as long as I have been doing things slightly outside my comfort zone, so always, I only get there with more time. Am I totally alone or does this resonate?

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#315

Post by zulgan »

lwb wrote: post #133

Something felt fishy about their claim that number of hours worked has been climbing in the United States so I checked their source. It turns out that "average annual hours worked" has changed from 1,780 in 2011 to 1,786 last year. This seems like barely a rounding error... On the other hand, if you look at the FRED website it shows that average annual hours worked has massively decreased in the last 50 years: https:…

I don't think it is possible to compare hours worked 100 years ago and now.

Now, especially for developers and office workers, work is almost indistinguishable from life.

For example there is barely any time while I am awake that I am not thinking about work. (sometimes even my dreams are about work related tech topics)

Not to mention that modern management techniques are deeply psychological, and sophisticated propaganda.

TBH I dont think more work is being done, I just think the corporation organism consumes as much as it can.

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#316

Post by bboygravity »

These recurring 4-day work week discussions on HN show how non-European this site is.

4-day work weeks have been completely normal for lots of people in Europe for decades. In the Netherlands it's almost the norm to chose whether you want to work 4 or 5 days. 4 day work weeks are not always accepted everywhere, but usually they are in most places.

In France the standard work week has been 35 hours for the past 2 decades, which may or may not equate to a 4 day work week depending on how you organize your work days.

The Netherlands and France are still alive and kicking. They have plenty of successful businesses.

Conclusion: no, 4 day work weeks will not destroy your country, economy, business or lifestyle. The one and only reason to have 5 day or longer work weeks is: greed. IMHO.

Having said that IMO a more important factor in time savings would be remote working or not. Assuming a commute of an hour a day to and from work (2 hours total per day, reality for lots of people) you waste 10 hours per week of your life commuting. Unpaid.

5 days a week without commute = -10 unpaid hours spent on work related things (vs with commute)

4 days a week with commute = -2 unpaid hours spent on work related things.

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#317

Post by dnh44 »

kody wrote: post #20
Ididntdothis wrote: post #8

It seems a lot of these experiments are a success. But after a while somebody gets greedy and thinks “we get good productivity at 32 hours. I wonder how much more we could get at 40 hours?” And soon you are back at the old schedule. Something similar happened at my company. For once a project was ahead of schedule. So instead of thinking that the system worked well and keep working in relaxed manner management decide…

I agree that it's hard for some people (managers) to see a relaxed, happy person and believe that they're also totally productive. I don't blame them either; I feel like the image of overly-caffeinated, stressed-out people is embedded in our collective consciousness as representative of High Productivity and our lizard brains can't seem to be able to reconcile that with the data that is saying "relaxed people who mak…

If it works for chickens I don't see why it can't work for people. Companies could brand themselves as "Free Range"

Happy workers lay nicer eggs!

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#318

Post by torgian »

Four day work week sounds great, but how do you prevent employers from taking advantage of that and saying, "Hey, as an hourly employee working four days a week, we don't have to cover your insurance because reasons".

I'm sure there are a lot of loopholes or rules that companies can't wait to exploit to pay people less money or fork over less money overall.

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#319

Post by [deleted] »

bboygravity wrote: post #316

These recurring 4-day work week discussions on HN show how non-European this site is. 4-day work weeks have been completely normal for lots of people in Europe for decades. In the Netherlands it's almost the norm to chose whether you want to work 4 or 5 days. 4 day work weeks are not always accepted everywhere, but usually they are in most places. In France the standard work week has been 35 hours for the past 2 deca…

[deleted]

Re: More bosses give four-day workweek a try

#320

Post by SnowProblem »

bboygravity wrote: post #316

These recurring 4-day work week discussions on HN show how non-European this site is. 4-day work weeks have been completely normal for lots of people in Europe for decades. In the Netherlands it's almost the norm to chose whether you want to work 4 or 5 days. 4 day work weeks are not always accepted everywhere, but usually they are in most places. In France the standard work week has been 35 hours for the past 2 deca…

> The Netherlands and France are still alive and kicking. They have plenty of successful businesses.

Are they? I can't think of a single technology company coming out of either.

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