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Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

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Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#41

Post by michaelt »

robg wrote: post #4

Curious among folks here: Are you aware of companies that allow for or even encourage four day work weeks?

I've heard of small/medium software companies doing it. Apparently it's a lot easier to arrange in smaller companies, and the economics for the business can be great if they're the only ones in the area offering it.

For example, if a divorced guy gets his kid on Friday and Saturday every week, it turns out getting every Friday off is a super-valuable benefit for him, and now you can hire a $120k programmer for $70k.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#42

Post by Syonyk »

burkaman wrote: post #28
Syonyk wrote: post #13

I've "corrupted" (from the point of view of GDP productivity and such) a lot of people into asking for (and mostly getting...) a 32h/week work schedule. I've been doing it for almost 8 years now, and at this point, it's simply a non-negotiable in any sort of employment discussions (that, and not carrying a pager). I work Mon-Thu, 8h/day, and I'm generally unreachable Fri/Sat/Sun (doesn't mean I won't put in a long we…

> it aligns better with my family (the local public school is only Mon-Thu as well) This is interesting and makes me think the answer to the title's question is public schools. Most Americans are not in a position to individually ask their employer for a 4-day week, but if the local school system does it, suddenly there's a unified block of thousands of people who really need Friday off to take care of their kids. I…

Huh. I actually didn't know it was that high - it's just the way the local district has worked for decades now.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#43

Post by RandomLensman »

zooq_ai wrote: post #23

4 hour work-week ain't happening. 1) Due to AI advancements, companies and business models are going to be disrupted. The last thing a firm wants is to work 4 day / week when competition can do 60 hour per week and leap frog them (including crushing them) at a crucial period. tl ; dr -- we are entering a crunch mode for many firms (vs stability where we can think of these luxuries) 2) US is already facing labor short…

1) Firms are happily wasting away a sizeable fraction of their resources now.

2) That would mean more competition for labor, i.e, if 4-day week is all you can get as an employer you take it.

3) Firms in knowledge roles want certain skills and profiles, if those want a 4-day week, then that is what will happen.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#44

Post by nickvec »

burkaman wrote: post #28
Syonyk wrote: post #13

I've "corrupted" (from the point of view of GDP productivity and such) a lot of people into asking for (and mostly getting...) a 32h/week work schedule. I've been doing it for almost 8 years now, and at this point, it's simply a non-negotiable in any sort of employment discussions (that, and not carrying a pager). I work Mon-Thu, 8h/day, and I'm generally unreachable Fri/Sat/Sun (doesn't mean I won't put in a long we…

> it aligns better with my family (the local public school is only Mon-Thu as well) This is interesting and makes me think the answer to the title's question is public schools. Most Americans are not in a position to individually ask their employer for a 4-day week, but if the local school system does it, suddenly there's a unified block of thousands of people who really need Friday off to take care of their kids. I…

Interesting. I hope the 4-day school week doesn't exacerbate the education / illiteracy crisis that we are already seeing in America. Not sure if less time in school would help with this, though difficult to comprehend the nuances associated with experiments like this until the data is available.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#45

Post by anjel »

otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #12
robg wrote: post #4

Curious among folks here: Are you aware of companies that allow for or even encourage four day work weeks?

Yes, these are the kinds of companies with 12 hour work days. Staffed by immigrants or poor people, usually.

...And Registered Nurses

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#46

Post by adam_gyroscope »

capital_guy wrote: post #38
robg wrote: post #4

Curious among folks here: Are you aware of companies that allow for or even encourage four day work weeks?

bit.io was a 4 day work week company before being acquired by databricks [0]. not sure if they kept that afterwards, seems unlikely https://www.databricks.com/blog/welcoming-bit-io-databricks-...

(bit.io CEO here) - databricks has a 5 day work week.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#47

Post by avgcorrection »

bloopernova wrote: post #9

Considering the opposition to working from home from some parts of (USA) society, I have trouble seeing this get widely adopted. At least in the short to medium term. The anti-WFH people appear to fall into 3 camps: landlords and property owners, middle management who believe people are not as productive or efficient at home. And, as pointed out in a reply, there's also the group who believe that face to face communi…

> rent-seeking landlords,

Mostly superfluous verb.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#48

Post by darreninthenet »

savanaly wrote: post #19
bloopernova wrote: post #9

Considering the opposition to working from home from some parts of (USA) society, I have trouble seeing this get widely adopted. At least in the short to medium term. The anti-WFH people appear to fall into 3 camps: landlords and property owners, middle management who believe people are not as productive or efficient at home. And, as pointed out in a reply, there's also the group who believe that face to face communi…

I'm not even in the anti-WFH camp, but notice you've selectively omitted the most sympathetic camp (what is this argument tactic called? Strawmanning?). People who think teams will be more agile and innovative when they can have impromptu face-to-face conversations. I personally think that's true, but not a big enough deal to make me favor RTO. But it's not good to summarize an issue in such a way that the other side…

Hasn't it been disproven now though? My employer at the time during lockdown saw productivity and collaboration increase, and they are a mostly agile approach organisation.

And there are many companies large and small with mostly or fully remote teams delivering complex projects every day as we speak.

Whilst I'm sure there are edge cases where that face to face actually is essential, the idea that for teams to be agile, innovative and collaborative they must physically sit near each other has been shown to be unnecessary...?

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#49

Post by Syonyk »

ketzo wrote: post #29
Syonyk wrote: post #13

I've "corrupted" (from the point of view of GDP productivity and such) a lot of people into asking for (and mostly getting...) a 32h/week work schedule. I've been doing it for almost 8 years now, and at this point, it's simply a non-negotiable in any sort of employment discussions (that, and not carrying a pager). I work Mon-Thu, 8h/day, and I'm generally unreachable Fri/Sat/Sun (doesn't mean I won't put in a long we…

What do you do for work? Where are you in your career?

Senior enough, and skilled enough in particular low level arts, that I can set my own terms.

And I do "weird low level crap." Generally if I'm interacting with the kernel, it's from below. Think introspection, emulation, hypervisors, "state analysis of a running kernel," firmware weeds, security analysis, etc.

If you know a bitter mid-to-late-40s sort who's been in the deep weeds and the security weeds long enough to carry a powered off flip phone and genuinely hate what we've done with computers, imagine that, and you're pretty close.

Re: Who will lead the charge to a four-day work week?

#50

Post by antisthenes »

rowyourboat wrote: post #33
robg wrote: post #4

Curious among folks here: Are you aware of companies that allow for or even encourage four day work weeks?

Yes, we let anybody reduce their work week to 80% - for 80% pay, of course.

That's not really a perk then.

The whole idea is to generate ~95% of value with 80% of the work time, and to split the difference money-wise.

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