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Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#141

Post by Loughla »

homakov wrote: post #131
d55 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you'd have the 60 hour work week pretty quick.

I'd quit. I'm a specialist and will easily find another job.

You seem not to understand the depth of that statement.

It's not that one company would have excess hours; all of them would. So, you would be free to find a new position. . . at another company with a 60 hour work week.

Look at the history of the labor movement. Those in power tended to abuse those that weren't; long hours, unsafe conditions, etc. Now, unless you work in a coal mine or foundry, we can count out unsafe work conditions.

That really leaves one other option. . . . . .

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#142

Post by mkempe »

fetbaffe wrote: post #128
mkempe wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The purpose is not to diminish time wasted by commuting. In many European cities and regions one does not commute for hours every day. For instance, my brother lives in a 2000 year-old city and walks to work -- it takes him 2 minutes. When I lived in London it took me 15-20 minutes to get to work, with the tube. In a Swiss city before that, 15 minutes driving. And for my job before that, 4 minutes biking.

However not the case in Göteborg.

The Swedish average commute is under 25 minutes (excluding the top 5% who travel an hour or more). [1] My friends' commute in Stockholm includes the walk to drop off kids at the local school. Is Göteborg worse than the rest of the country?

[1] http://jamda.ub.gu.se/handle/1/738

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#143

Post by digitalengineer »

chrisgd wrote: post #96
furyg3 wrote: post #56

I 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

Let me guess... You were raised Christian? Protestant perhaps? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protestant_work_ethic

(EDIT: It's about the feeling of guild, people. It's embedded inside the Protestant Culture, alongside with working hard. As mentioned in Wikipedia link)

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#144

Post by vasquez »

justnotsure wrote: post #83
oellegaard wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The innovative Scandinavian economy has resulted in the highest general happiness for its citizens. Maybe you should consider why you actually work - is it because work is the best thing that every happened to you, or something you do so you can afford to take the rest of your time off and hangout with friends and/or family?

So why in Norway they vote extreme right? Here is your dirty secret about Breiviks and Scandinavia: we can pay high taxes as long as it goes to us. But the very second it goes to Muslims, immigrants, etc. we are not socialist anymore. We are more like national socialists ;-) You see scnadinavian socialism seems to work only in national states. Once you have high immigration and you pay for immigrants, nobody wants it…

There's no extreme right in Norway (at least not in the parliament). The so-called "extreme right" progress party are left of the US Democrats in all(?) matters.

With only 16% of the votes they also lost 1/4th their seats from the previous election, which was won by a labor/left coalition.

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#145

Post by vidarh »

justnotsure wrote: post #134
vidarh wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point was that your supposedly amazing free market was not what led to the 8-hour day. It took bloodshed and illegal strikes; demonstrations and decades of fighting for legislation.

Please note that in communistic states people worked regularly over 8 hours long after 8-hours work week was legislated in the USA. My point is that system evolution via democratic process is much better than bloody revolution that left-wing quite often has on its mouth.

What does "communistic states" have to do with anything? They were/are kleptocratic oligarchies that are so stratified that they have even worse class systems than capitalist states.

> My point is that system evolution via democratic process is much better than bloody revolution that left-wing quite often has on its mouth.

It was not evolution via democratic process that gave us the 8 hour day. It was not bloody revolution either, but plenty of blood has been shed during the fight for decent working conditions. People were outright killed. People were arrested. People were intimidated; blacklisted.

The current system is only as good as it is because our forefathers were brave enough to stand up and fight even when they had to break the law, and even when they in many cases risked their life to fight the conditions of the time.

And they had to: Plenty of people died because of the disproportionate powers of employees to dictate conditions. Such as the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, where 146 people died when the factory burned because the employees kept the doors locked during working hours to prevent unauthorized breaks(!):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangle_Shirtwaist_Factory_fir...

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#147

Post by jacques_chester »

gjm11 wrote: post #82
wobbleblob wrote: post #47

> "though the United States is an outlier here, working both long and hard" The article conflates productivity with 'working hard'. Productivity is a measure of how much value is produced ('money is made') per hour of work. A bulldozer operator working an 8 hour day to move a few tons of dirt is more productive than a worker who needs many 12 hour work days to move the same amount of dirt with a shovel and wheelbarro…

I fear you're also conflating two things: money made and actual value produced. Suppose the trader is selling credit default swaps and helping cause a big financial crash, or the bulldozer operator is destroying acres of forest to clear the way for a tobacco plantation. What they do may be very valuable to the people paying them (and hence, if they're lucky, lucrative for them personally) but have substantially negat…

> I fear you're also conflating two things: money made and actual value produced.

The problem is that the definition of "actual value" turns out to be devilishly difficult to pin down. There's no objective measure for it. Value is subjective.

This is one of the central riddles of economics. But it's also why exchanges happen at all.

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#148

Post by crusso »

klunger wrote: post #84
furyg3 wrote: post #56

I 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

You know what happened to most of the people throughout the history of Northern Europe who weren't good at planning ahead by building great shelters and collecting food for long, cold winters?

They didn't contribute very much to the genetic and cultural pool that exists in those areas today.

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#149

Post by amirmc »

comrade1 wrote: post #72
furyg3 wrote: post #56

I 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 have the same experience in Switzerland. I moved from the u.s. (s.f., boston, dc, socal) and despite working less we get a lot more done than in the u.s. We have an 8.5 hour workday in Switzerland which we strictly stick to - we get comp time if you work over. In the u.s. we were pretty regularly working 10 hour days and 12 wasn't unusual, but we were wasting so much time. A good example is meetings - most people g…

And yet people complain about the pointlessness of meetings despite not doing anything to make them more efficient (cf start and end on time, avoid chit-chat, stick to the agenda, send actions quickly afterwards etc). It only takes a small about of self-discipline to get there but everyone has to exercise it.

I'm lucky to have learned from some excellent meeting-chairs but have only been able to reproduce the efficiency when I formed and ran my own team. Never pulled it off when joining someone else's.

Re: Sweden’s proposed six-hour workday

#150

Post by th3iedkid »

gjm11 wrote: post #82
wobbleblob wrote: post #47

> "though the United States is an outlier here, working both long and hard" The article conflates productivity with 'working hard'. Productivity is a measure of how much value is produced ('money is made') per hour of work. A bulldozer operator working an 8 hour day to move a few tons of dirt is more productive than a worker who needs many 12 hour work days to move the same amount of dirt with a shovel and wheelbarro…

I fear you're also conflating two things: money made and actual value produced. Suppose the trader is selling credit default swaps and helping cause a big financial crash, or the bulldozer operator is destroying acres of forest to clear the way for a tobacco plantation. What they do may be very valuable to the people paying them (and hence, if they're lucky, lucrative for them personally) but have substantially negat…

> but have substantially negative net value by any reasonable measure.

if we were to go by entropy measures there is nothing we can do about it .

So what is of value?

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