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We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

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Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#21

Post by mattschoch »

bertzzie wrote: post #5
Zigurd wrote: post #2

Until we come to grips with what will likely be a post-labor world, this is a good transitional approach. The 40 hour week is an arbitrary standard, and it may now be rational to reduce that number. Few jobs are now so arduous that 70 year olds cannot perform well. We are suffering from outdated standards for work weeks and retirement age, and un-sticking our assumptions is likely to benefit the situation.

> Few jobs are now so arduous that 70 year olds cannot perform well. I think it's mostly physical jobs that 70 year olds cannot perform well. And that kind of job can be automated by robots anyway. For job like programming or CEO, I kind of think that 70 year olds can do better than say 20 year olds.

>>For job like programming or CEO, I kind of think that 70 year olds can do better than say 20 year olds.

Maybe in 50 years, but currently I'd say a 20-30 years old is the prime programmer age. Young people tend to learn new tech quicker, and be faster/more efficient at typing and using computers.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#23

Post by ekianjo »

Zigurd wrote: post #2

Until we come to grips with what will likely be a post-labor world, this is a good transitional approach. The 40 hour week is an arbitrary standard, and it may now be rational to reduce that number. Few jobs are now so arduous that 70 year olds cannot perform well. We are suffering from outdated standards for work weeks and retirement age, and un-sticking our assumptions is likely to benefit the situation.

> what will likely be a post-labor world

Says who ? This preposterous way of thinking has been around for x years already. "when the world population will reach 4 billions people, there will be no jobs for everyone", yet the population is still increasing beyond 6 billions and most people still work to live/survive. There is no hint we are moving to a post-labor world.

You will see that there is a strong relationship between reduced employment/working hours, welfare benefits when not working, and government spending. And somehow most of the countries which went down that way have now humongous public debt problems to solve. Their model is not sustainable in the long term.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#25

Post by sievert »

ekianjo wrote: post #17

25 hours to earn less? What's the point of having more free time if you have no money to do anything with it ? There's a reason why we have a current optimal 40-60 hours kind of range for working hours in most countries. That's an equilibrium point between how much people are willing to work vs how much they are willing to earn. Everyone still wants to have free time, but not at the expense of their well-being or the…

The argument here is about quality of life. I suspect the reason you mention income is that you believe it is nessecary to be able to do things outside of work.

I personally earn more than I need to get by, and I'm sure as I get older and have more commitments I'll want to forgo money in exchange for time.

Also income (or at least productivity) and time spent at work is not a linear relationship. I think this is a great idea.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#26

Post by ekianjo »

_delirium wrote: post #20
ekianjo wrote: post #17

25 hours to earn less? What's the point of having more free time if you have no money to do anything with it ? There's a reason why we have a current optimal 40-60 hours kind of range for working hours in most countries. That's an equilibrium point between how much people are willing to work vs how much they are willing to earn. Everyone still wants to have free time, but not at the expense of their well-being or the…

Because of standardization on "normal" workweeks, it's pretty hard to have the choice even if you're willing to forego salary for fewer hours. Google won't let you work a 4-day week for 80% of the regular salary, for example (or even for 60% of it!), and more traditional companies are even less likely to. You take their 5-day, 40-hour offer or you don't. You typically only have an option to work a 25-hour week if you…

Note that the standardization you are talking about is also heavily driven by work regulations, saying that a work week is x hours and nothing else. If such restrictions were abolished I believe there would be much more flexibility (up and down) in the job market.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#27

Post by pteredactyl »

Zigurd wrote: post #2

Until we come to grips with what will likely be a post-labor world, this is a good transitional approach. The 40 hour week is an arbitrary standard, and it may now be rational to reduce that number. Few jobs are now so arduous that 70 year olds cannot perform well. We are suffering from outdated standards for work weeks and retirement age, and un-sticking our assumptions is likely to benefit the situation.

I agree we are stuck in an outdated model however I am not keen on someone me telling how many hours I can or should work.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#28

Post by ekianjo »

zht wrote: post #8
bertzzie wrote: post #3

This is interesting. I live in Indonesia, where except on our capital (Jakarta and most Java), working 60 hours a week is the norm. I have noticed (and I think this has been proved over and over again) that people who works 60 hours a week is actually less productive and less happy than those who have a free weekends and work only 8 hours a day. I wonder how much working time can we cut until the benefits disappear.

do you have extremely long days but 5 days a week or do you spread it out over 6 or 7 days?

In Japan, by the way, it is not uncommon to work 6 days a week (Saturdays). It depends on your contract.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#29

Post by zanny »

ekianjo wrote: post #17

25 hours to earn less? What's the point of having more free time if you have no money to do anything with it ? There's a reason why we have a current optimal 40-60 hours kind of range for working hours in most countries. That's an equilibrium point between how much people are willing to work vs how much they are willing to earn. Everyone still wants to have free time, but not at the expense of their well-being or the…

If I could make enough to eat, keep the lights on, and pay an internet bill, I'd be satiated.

Problem is that unless you go for contract work (which doesn't really translate into 25 hours a week), you won't get a 20 hour a week part time software development gig, even if it had a 35k salary attached. I much prefer working on the projects I want to than those that people are willing to pay me for.

Re: We should only work 25 hours a week, argues professor

#30

Post by sievert »

mattschoch wrote: post #15

Great idea in theory, but there's a reason young people work such long hours: money. If a 22 year old graduates from college and works 25 hours a week, they won't have enough money to pay off their (almost certain) debt and live comfortably, much less have excess money to spend traveling and doing fun things. Young people work so hard so they can have the money to buy and do the things they want. Most just never stop…

In Denmark college is free or close to it, I don't think they've got massive debts to pay.
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