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Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

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Re: Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

#12

Post by epaga »

tacostakohashi wrote: post #2

I'd be fine with 4 days / week for 80% salary. I don't expect too many employers would be happy with 100% of the overheads (health insurance, office space, administration) for 80% of the productivity.

I work a 4-day week myself, and I'd guesstimate my productivity more at around 85-90% of a 5-day week. Friday afternoons were always pretty low-productivity as it is, and working only 4 days a week is WAY more motivating than a full 5-day grind, so the other days become more productive on average.

Re: Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

#14

Post by jsjsbdkj »

I don't think startups really care about saving 20% on salaries - I think if we're going to get 4-day workweeks the argument needs to be around attracting candidates, and pointing to improved productivity. It's mind-boggling to me how companies are like "there's no qualified candidates", and at least superficially they trip over themselves for "diversity" candidates to make their numbers look better, but they're unwilling to change anyting to attract candidates who have lives outside of work. There's 100% a pool of people who could do amazing work who don't get a chance because startups have this brutal monoculture that excludes them.

Re: Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

#15

Post by fuball63 »

I currently do this, but I work all 5 weekdays. I just work shorter days Monday - Wednesday.

I love it, it is my favorite perk of the job I have. I'm able to use my afternoons to exercise, take care of chores around the house, and run errands if necessary. My night after dinner time is completely free.

Another perk that's similar but not exactly the same thing is flexible schedule, meaning if I have something to do during work, I can "make up the hours" later. This is especially powerful when you work 80% time normally.

I would say that the reason most companies don't want to do 4 day weeks is because of meeting schedules. This is why I'm here each work day; so I can be at my team standups every day.

Re: Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

#16

Post by philmcp »

From an employers perspective, I believe there are many advantages:

- 4 day week job listings get 15% more applications [1]

- Staff will be more productive. Microsoft experimented with a 4-day work week and productivity jumped by 40% [2]

- Staff will be happier and healthier [3]

- Staff retention will improve (e.g. "Now that I'm working a 4 day week, I could never go back to work 5 days")

- Some developers would compromise salary. In our current poll 84% of people would prefer to either work 3 days @ 60% salary or 4 days @ 80% salary

- Reduced office costs (e.g. close the office 1 day per week)

- It's better for the environment (e.g. less travel, closed offices etc)

[1] https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/four-day-workweek-res...

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/04/microsoft...

[3] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38843341

Link to the poll: https://twitter.com/philostar/status/1393199633543966723

Link to the website: https://www.4dayweek.io

Re: Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

#17

Post by sdevonoes »

I would work 4 days per week (this is, 32h/week) for 100% salary. I'm not joking. The current 5 day/week, 40h/week is nonsense: the only reason software companies offer such a contract is because of "tradition", they are not interested in thinking about "Hey, perhaps working less than 40h/week makes us equally productive? Let's try!".

Some companies in some countries offer 7.5h/day (37.5h/week) and NOTHING bad happened. Turns out it probably improves the lives of the company's employees (which in turn, improves the company itself).

No, I wouldn't work 4 days per week for 80% of the salary. Hell, I would be more productive working 4 days per week! Why on earth would I receive less money? If any, pay me more. Obviously, this only applies to a few jobs out there (e.g., software engineering).

Re: Ask HN: Would you rather work 4 days per week for 80% salary?

#19

Post by lsy »

beforeolives wrote: post #5

> I've talked to 100+ companies trying to convince them to offer their developer roles I wouldn't be happy if I heard that some random person is contacting my employer to change the contract and payment structure at the company I work for. Advocating for yourself is one thing, cold calling companies and potentially affecting people that never asked for this is just wrong. Even if it's just to offer it as an option an…

This is an extremely strange criticism. Unless you have some kind of strong union or co-op situation, as an employee you have almost zero control over the contract and payment structure at your company, and management’s decisions around it are influenced by factors as varied as “their spouse’s wishes” or “something they heard Elon Musk say on a podcast” or “a Tony Robbins quote on LinkedIn”. Having someone cold-call with their ideas isn’t any different from the other capricious reasons your management can change your working conditions.
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