Germany seems to be unrealistically low in the diagram. It is very untypical for people here to work less than 40 hours per week and lunch hour is not included in the work time (means you actually stay 45 hours at work in a usual contract).
Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
91–100 of 272 posts
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#92Greece is second in the list of most working hours per year and still heavily indebted. The price of political corruption.
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#93The innovative US economy will make it all irrelevant anyway by introducing more and more work from home jobs. Work from home is almost common in the US and basically non-existent in Europe. I wouldn't trade Swedish 6-hour workday with my American-based 8-hour while working from my coach at home. Somehow socialists are always one step behind Mother Nature, i.e. free markets.
The "innovative US economy" had to be forced by socialist unions to cut the working day to roughly 8 days. It took decades of strikes, demonstrations and bloodshed to reach that goal. You know why people demonstrate and celebrate workers right on May 1st? Because then largely socialist and anarchist US unions decided, led by the AFL, in 1888 to restart demonstrations for the 8 hour working day with a major demonstrat…
Capitalism allows for the concept of unions, and in no way inherently outlaws or stops labor from unionizing. It was in fact Capitalist unions, in a Capitalist system, that you're referring to.
And in fact it was one of the so called Capitalist robber barons, Henry Ford, who had the greatest impact on shifting to the 40 hour work week. He proved it could work and blazed the path for all other industrialists to follow (either by choice or by Ford stealing their labor via better terms).
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#94I moved from the US (high on the list) to the Netherlands (bottom of the list) a while ago. Different jobs and sectors vary, but the theme I can confirm is that the Dutch feel more productive, generally (I work in software development). In very broad terms, the Dutch are more likely to plan and stick to those plans. Personal time and time off are valued, so you need to be efficient in your working hours. You can't re…
I've had the same experience in Norway. Maybe it is a Northern European thing? Edited: Scandinavian -> Norther Europe
The Netherlands are not part of Scandinavia.
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#95Why does government set N hours at all ? It's must be up to business! E.g., if I have a software company, I want my employees to work 20 hours a week. Isn't it obviously better way for everyone?
When it was left up to business, we had 14 hour+ days. It took many decades of extensive strikes and demonstrations, during which dozens of workers were killed, before the 8 hour day became the norm. The US union that is now the AFL-CIO leadership in pushing for the 8 hour day led directly to making May 1st the international day for labor demonstrations, in part in commemoration of the Chicago Haymarket Massacre. If…
Do you hate capitalism?
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#96I moved from the US (high on the list) to the Netherlands (bottom of the list) a while ago. Different jobs and sectors vary, but the theme I can confirm is that the Dutch feel more productive, generally (I work in software development). In very broad terms, the Dutch are more likely to plan and stick to those plans. Personal time and time off are valued, so you need to be efficient in your working hours. You can't re…
I don't know how to change that feeling though (short of moving out of the US). I believe I could work 6-8 hrs / day and no one would care but I can't stop feeling guilty at home
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#97This stood out to me: >The Swedish town of Kiruna actually gave up its six-hour working days in 2005 after finding that the increased intensity of work was not a positive. "People have seen there that the intensity of the job increases significantly, with negative effects on health as a consequence," Could that be because we are used to fit our work in 8 hours and work accordingly? Doing 100% of your work in 75% of t…
This was the big problem in France when they passed the 35h work week with no pay loss. Workers were suddenly expected to do the same output in 4h less, and this increased stress levels quite a bit -- or so I've been told by friends who live there.
As far as I know, the 40->37 hour shift in Denmark didn't produce similar negative consequences. It's a slightly smaller change (7.5% rather than 12.5% reduction in working hours), but I'm not sure that's the main reason. Perhaps something about how Danish workplaces are structured compared to French ones?
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#98Why isn't it just standard to be paid by the hour? A fixed hours-per-week seems backwards.
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#99I hope we start seeing more things like this, especially in the US. Does 6 hours a day maximize happiness / productivity? I don't know. Does 8 hours? It's the custom, but I don't know. I think it's almost impossible that 8 hours is the best number across every industry => vertical => company. I'd love to see more experimentation
8 hours for work, 8 for leisure, 8 for sleep and 2 rest days a week seems reasonable, at least mathematically speaking. If it were up to me, I'd include commuting time in those 8 work hours as well, making the number no more than 7 hours.
Sounds pretty arbitrary. It seems to me that a huge number of jobs are all about providing entertainment for people who are too knackered from work to take part in an intellectually and/or physically satisfying hobby. If we could distribute the real jobs evenly how many hours would we _need_ to work to maintain our lifestyle?
Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe it simply is not possible for us swedes to work from home like that because of our smaller houses? I certainly wouldn't know where to put the chemistry lab or the industrial robots. I barely have room for the mine-shaft.
I thought you must have bigger houses? no? I mean how can you claim to have better standard of living and live happier life in a small house without any space?
It's always a tough choice between a huge house in sprawlville on one side of spectrum and a tiny apartment in the centre of the (non-urban-flighted, alive and walkable) city.
And of course everything in between.
You can't say that in "better standard of living", home size matters and home location doesn't. Europeans have less sprawl but smaller houses, that's just it.