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A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

nytimes.com

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Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#21

Post by buzzy_hacker »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #15
jen729w wrote: post #3

Some time last year I stopped working Mondays. I’m a contractor and I know my boss well, so I just said that I didn’t want to work Mondays any more. The difference is remarkable. You go from spending three quarters of your days at work to just over half. The weekend is actually relaxing. You can do chores, relax, and really unwind before the work week starts again. We use Mondays to work on our side projects. You can…

I personally find my weekends a bit exhausting because of my 5 year old, and get to relax at just doing my professional job on Monday when he is back to school. I fear that 3 day weekends every week (since we shouldn’t leave day care workers and teachers out of this) would be the end of me. I’m sure my perspective will change after we are out of the needy kid stage, but even before my son was born, I liked working (I…

> I fear that 3 day weekends every week (since we shouldn’t leave day care workers and teachers out of this) would be the end of me.

We could have different groups of people take off different third days. My preference would be to have Wednesdays off.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#23

Post by codelord »

I wonder what the perspective of other people who run businesses or manage teams are on this subject? I have managed teams at top tech companies in bay area in the past (although switched back to an engineering position recently). Regardless of the company, I have always wondered why everyone around me is working so slowly. Things that a good engineer should be able to do in a day gets done in a month or more. When working as an engineer people always commented that I'm very efficient. But honestly I think the reason is a lot of people just barely put 10 hours a week in the current 5 days a week routine. Lots of times I feel like you could just let 60-70% of people go at companies I've worked at and literally nothing changes. My experience has been that a handful of high output individuals at each company are responsible for 90% of things that gets done. So I wonder what happens if we reduce this even more? Probably nothing, because high output individuals usually have intrinsic motivations and will continue putting more hours than is required.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#24

Post by bigDinosaur »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #15
jen729w wrote: post #3

Some time last year I stopped working Mondays. I’m a contractor and I know my boss well, so I just said that I didn’t want to work Mondays any more. The difference is remarkable. You go from spending three quarters of your days at work to just over half. The weekend is actually relaxing. You can do chores, relax, and really unwind before the work week starts again. We use Mondays to work on our side projects. You can…

I personally find my weekends a bit exhausting because of my 5 year old, and get to relax at just doing my professional job on Monday when he is back to school. I fear that 3 day weekends every week (since we shouldn’t leave day care workers and teachers out of this) would be the end of me. I’m sure my perspective will change after we are out of the needy kid stage, but even before my son was born, I liked working (I…

It's funny how the most honest groups of people with respect to the purpose of schooling is parents with young kids. Basically what you want is daycare and it just so happens that school fulfills that on Monday. Not judging, I think that's a very common perspective, but amused.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#25

Post by TedDoesntTalk »

donatj wrote: post #11

While I could certainly get the same amount of work done in 4 stressful days I'm currently getting done in a leisurely 5, I'd rather have the latter. I'd honestly probably rather work 6 even more leisurely days, it's not like I'm not just messing around on the computer anyway.

…and it is people like you who will spoil it for the rest of us because we will be measured against the status quo.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#27

Post by strken »

sn0w_crash wrote: post #2

If you’re working 20% less than your competitor, you will fall behind. There’s no amount of mental gymnastics one can do to reconcile that fact. And if true, then the market should resolve this.

If your output scales linearly with your input, and you're working less than your competitor, you will fall behind.

If the gradient of your input-to-output curve becomes negative and stays negative, and you're working less than your competitor, then your competitor will fall behind if they're working sufficiently far past the point of negative returns.

I'm pretty sure the gradient of all input-to-output curves becomes negative at some point, and don't see any reason why that point should be exactly 40 hours a week. It could be more and it could be less, and probably depends on a whole bunch of other factors, but exactly 40 hours spread evenly across 5 days seems oddly specific.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#28

Post by systemvoltage »

sn0w_crash wrote: post #2

If you’re working 20% less than your competitor, you will fall behind. There’s no amount of mental gymnastics one can do to reconcile that fact. And if true, then the market should resolve this.

The beauty is that I want this experiment to run and see how it performs. The pessimism I have (based on last 10-15 years of decline and anti-capitalist motifs today) is that we're going to shy away from looking at the performance of this project anyways and prevent anyone from talking about it. 4-day workweeks will become the de-facto standard. By force. My prediction is that we will see shaming of companies that even try to go against the grain and institute 5-day work weeks.

We're living in a hyper-emotional empathy-based irrational society that prevents people from even asking probing questions; prevents us from seeking truth by using tools of reason and logic. If you want a proof of this, just read old HN threads. People were so damn amazing at the time, everyone had a basic tenet of rationale. Not everything is falling, but the trend is worrying.

I'd like to see 6-day work weeks as an experiment. I am not convinced that 20% less time is 20% less productivity. Far more important is whether people are motivated and happy.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#29

Post by TedDoesntTalk »

sn0w_crash wrote: post #2

If you’re working 20% less than your competitor, you will fall behind. There’s no amount of mental gymnastics one can do to reconcile that fact. And if true, then the market should resolve this.

Not everyone chooses that his life be dedicated to keeping up with or beating the competition.

Re: A six-month program in Britain will assess the effects of a shorter workweek

#30

Post by brokenmachine »

donatj wrote: post #11

While I could certainly get the same amount of work done in 4 stressful days I'm currently getting done in a leisurely 5, I'd rather have the latter. I'd honestly probably rather work 6 even more leisurely days, it's not like I'm not just messing around on the computer anyway.

Some of us have a life and interests outside work.
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