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World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

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Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#11

Post by TeMPOraL »

kennywinker wrote: post #5
mrmincent wrote: post #3

I’ve gone down to 4 days, taking Fridays off to look after my son, and I certainly won’t be going back to 5 days until he’s in school. Looking after a toddler all day isn’t exactly a day off, but it is extremely rewarding, and something I’d recommend to any parent thinking about dropping down a day. It definitely has some downsides however, I’m the only one in the team that’s off that day, so there’s usually meetings…

Based on most of the studies i’ve seen, at least for office/information jobs, that pay cut is unjustified. People mostly get as much done in 4 days as 5.

Usual counterpoint is that you're not being paid just for the things you get done, but also for availability - for being there when there's a need to handle something unexpected. This has real value to a business, so you being available for 80% of the time justifies some degree of pay cut.

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#13

Post by vouaobrasil »

When was a mathematician, I worked as hard as I could until I was mentally exhausted. I actually calculated how much I worked per week over a period of two years.

On actual "hard thinking", like working through logic, I spent about 7 hours. There was another 7 hours writing and clarifying topics, and another 6 hours or so on classes, seminars (sort of like meetings, but productive). That gives a total of 20 hours per week on work. Beyond that, I was not productive and so I didn't do any math-related work.

If you add the administrative overhead of a job, that might be another 5 hours at most, so about 3 full workdays. I think if you are truly just doing productive, meaningful technical work, beyond 3 full days most people can't do it. People can do it for short periods of time, but more than 3 days leads to universal burnout.

Now, I'm just talking about mentally demanding, technical work. I can work longer if the work isn't very mentally demanding, but even so, not for more than 4-5 hours a day. And now I'm an independent content creator, so every additional hour I work is proportional to profit.

My conclusions after observing a ton of people in technical and nontechnical jobs is that beyond working 20-25 hours a week, having people do more is useless, especially when it comes to fostering people in the long-term (short term is different).

I feel the only reason why we have 9-5, Monday to Friday jobs is because of infantile narcissists who have no other purpose in life than to go to work and push people like machines.

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#14

Post by kennywinker »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #11
kennywinker wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on most of the studies i’ve seen, at least for office/information jobs, that pay cut is unjustified. People mostly get as much done in 4 days as 5.

Usual counterpoint is that you're not being paid just for the things you get done, but also for availability - for being there when there's a need to handle something unexpected. This has real value to a business, so you being available for 80% of the time justifies some degree of pay cut.

Maybe for some jobs. But for the majority of software jobs? Not really.

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#15

Post by kennywinker »

yamtaddle wrote: post #9
kennywinker wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on most of the studies i’ve seen, at least for office/information jobs, that pay cut is unjustified. People mostly get as much done in 4 days as 5.

It may be "justified" while five days remains the norm, as it may be possible to get similarly-capable employees to take the position for lower pay, to get that extra day off every week. This should provide a pretty big benefit to companies that can leverage it while five is still typical (assuming that the shift to four is in fact going to become a trend)

Thinking like an employer - how can i leverage social norms to get same or more work for less pay. If you’re not an employer, why are you thinking about it this way?

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#16

Post by quacked »

I don't like the Four Day Work Week because most of the people who are allowed to experiment with it are working on bullshit. I'm not a big Graeber fan, but I emphatically agree with his idea that the majority of actual hours worked inside the continental US are largely useless make-work in order to justify the existence of a monied consumer class.

Such a huge amount of the actual work that needs to be done so that we live in first-world comfort--textiles, agriculture, fuel chemicals, etc.--is so outsourced to developing countries that use serf-equivalent labor working 6 or 7 day weeks (in the same way that Americans did 150 years ago), or foreign migrant workers, that I don't actually have a sense of how much work is really needed to make the modern world function. If I get a four day workweek to make PowerPoints and write requirements documents for video calling software, is that actually a fair amount of work? If you divided the amount of non-bullshit work that went into sustaining America by the number of workers here, would we have a one-day workweek? A seven-day workweek?

Perhaps it's less accurate to say "I don't like the four day work week" than it is to say "I am suspicious that I deserve a four day work week given my consumption of resources". I of course would like to work as little as possible and would immediately accept a 4-day if it were offered.

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#17

Post by NKosmatos »

Why would they want to return? One you do an “upgrade” in your life, i.e. like remote work, quality family time, it’s difficult/impossible to go back. The same is true for many other life “upgrades” like fiber internet connection, smart devices, smartphones, color TVs and so on

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#18

Post by yamtaddle »

kennywinker wrote: post #15
yamtaddle wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be "justified" while five days remains the norm, as it may be possible to get similarly-capable employees to take the position for lower pay, to get that extra day off every week. This should provide a pretty big benefit to companies that can leverage it while five is still typical (assuming that the shift to four is in fact going to become a trend)

Thinking like an employer - how can i leverage social norms to get same or more work for less pay. If you’re not an employer, why are you thinking about it this way?

Oh, sure, I think employees ought to organize to increase wages in general. But absent that, the value of perks like a four-day work week (while it remains an unusual perk, at least) do factor into wage negotiations, and individuals can't do much to resist that on their own (aside from... not get the job and keep working five days somewhere else). I'm talking "is", not, "ought", in describing it the way I did.

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#19

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

kennywinker wrote: post #5
mrmincent wrote: post #3

I’ve gone down to 4 days, taking Fridays off to look after my son, and I certainly won’t be going back to 5 days until he’s in school. Looking after a toddler all day isn’t exactly a day off, but it is extremely rewarding, and something I’d recommend to any parent thinking about dropping down a day. It definitely has some downsides however, I’m the only one in the team that’s off that day, so there’s usually meetings…

Based on most of the studies i’ve seen, at least for office/information jobs, that pay cut is unjustified. People mostly get as much done in 4 days as 5.

Honestly I don't even care. If I could take an extra day off at only 20% cut from my pay check I'd do it in a heart beat.

Re: World’s largest four-day work week trial finds few are going back

#20

Post by themodelplumber »

vouaobrasil wrote: post #13

When was a mathematician, I worked as hard as I could until I was mentally exhausted. I actually calculated how much I worked per week over a period of two years. On actual "hard thinking", like working through logic, I spent about 7 hours. There was another 7 hours writing and clarifying topics, and another 6 hours or so on classes, seminars (sort of like meetings, but productive). That gives a total of 20 hours per…

That reasoning is complicated IMO by the fact that many jobs involve projects and tasks that are perceived as very important, yet will never be started, let alone continued, let alone completed.

That's a pretty big deal as-is. It can easily make the boss feel justified--OK this employee said we need to do this thing, they said they want to take it on, but it's not being done. The boss is in the loop and may feel like the employee wants to be pushed, checked in on, and so on.

But even then, add to this the stronger element of subjective mental torture often found at work, where the infantile pusher is none other than the self.

This element will stick the butt in the chair and turn the individual into a workaholic who sees no point in leaving to go home, because they are staying until it gets done. So still--50, 60, 80 hours in the office. Frustration, try harder. See some progress. OK, keep doing this.

Mix in a little bit of competitive thinking on the part of others ("wait, _they_ are working 50 hours even though we green-lit 25 hour weeks?") and this gets hour-reduction going sideways.

(This also relates fairly easily to persona-based theories of personality dynamics)

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