World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’ • Hacker News Board

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#11

Post by soganess » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:41 AM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #10

ashtonkem wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That argument was used against a lot of things that turned out to be a good thing, like the 40 hour work week. What’s your suggesting other than naysaying this trial?

I'm suggesting we have 0 data, and this study is nothing more than an opportunity for people to advocate for the policies they wanted anyway. Which is fine, you can say that 4-day weeks is better b/c it's nicer! That's ok! Just don't try to dress this fluff up as science.

That just seems like moving the goal post. Without a trial to explore efficacy, it is a pie-in-the-sky idea that shouldn't be taken seriously. When a trial happens...well this trial isn't really indicative of how people will truly behave when not in trial... we should just discount the results.

I guess there really are no true Scotsman in Iceland.

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#12

Post by npunt » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:42 AM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #10

ashtonkem wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That argument was used against a lot of things that turned out to be a good thing, like the 40 hour work week. What’s your suggesting other than naysaying this trial?

I'm suggesting we have 0 data, and this study is nothing more than an opportunity for people to advocate for the policies they wanted anyway. Which is fine, you can say that 4-day weeks is better b/c it's nicer! That's ok! Just don't try to dress this fluff up as science.

This was a four year study involving 2500 participants. You may feel the evidence is insufficient to make the policy changes they did as a result, but if you feel this is fluff dressed up as science it might be nice to understand what you found problematic about this study's methods for it to not qualify as adding to the body of scientific evidence we have on this topic.

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#13

Post by throwaway984393 » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:42 AM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #9

bpodgursky wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We observed that customers were very happy M-Th when we were working. We have no data on Friday (because we were PTO) but we consider it reasonable to extrapolate the same results."

Don’t be silly, if customers were unhappy about the lack of service on Friday, they will let you know between Monday and Thursday.

This assumes customers would want to return three days later just to tell you that a problem happened last week. Most people do not do this, especially if they can make it work on Monday.

Nearly every time that I experience a problem on a website, I try to report the bug / customer experience. And nearly every single time, if it's even possible for me to report it at all, it takes me 30+ minutes just to figure out how to report it. And that's during customer service hours! If it happened when customer service wasn't there, I'm definitely not coming back the next week just to tell them their website has bugs.

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#14

Post by justshowpost » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:48 AM UTC

I don't get it. Hours cut by 20% and no wage cut means 25% man-hour production gain for «success». Did they achieve this?

----

Okay, okay, I stand corrected, 10% hours cut requires only +11% to production to stay on par. Still quite much, but not impossible (I think).

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#15

Post by hellbannedguy » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:51 AM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #3

One of the lessons of trying to optimize worker productivity, health and happiness during the industrial revolution is that almost any change was an "overwhelming success" during the trial period, because of some combination of (1) a change of routine, (2) placebo effect -- people like the idea that someone is trying to help them and their mood improves accordingly. Might even be true here (it would be nice!), but in…

I've only met one person who wasen't for a four day 10 hr/day work week.

He was a Electrician acquaintance of my father.

He was beyond a odd duck. His idea of a fun weekend was painting his house. I'm not kidding.

I used to talk to my father a lot over a four day work week. His union almost got it, but they backed out at the last moment. I still think it was a payola thing from the contractors!

It just makes so much sence in certain fields.

Most of my work life has been construction in San Francisco. Just getting to, and back, from the job site is a hassle.

A four day work week would be grand.

Even though the work is back breaking, working ten, or eight hours did not affect productivity, or at least with me.

I would still be an union electrician making twice what I do now if they offered a four day work week.

(This mainly goes for union construction, and office jobs. Non-union jobs work their employees to hard. I don't know how most of those guys even last 8 hours. If you happen to read this, and are in construction try to get into a union. Just trust me.)

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#16

Post by paulcole » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:54 AM UTC

hellbannedguy wrote: post #15

bpodgursky wrote: post #3

One of the lessons of trying to optimize worker productivity, health and happiness during the industrial revolution is that almost any change was an "overwhelming success" during the trial period, because of some combination of (1) a change of routine, (2) placebo effect -- people like the idea that someone is trying to help them and their mood improves accordingly. Might even be true here (it would be nice!), but in…

I've only met one person who wasen't for a four day 10 hr/day work week. He was a Electrician acquaintance of my father. He was beyond a odd duck. His idea of a fun weekend was painting his house. I'm not kidding. I used to talk to my father a lot over a four day work week. His union almost got it, but they backed out at the last moment. I still think it was a payola thing from the contractors! It just makes so much…

> I've only met one person who wasen't for a four day 10 hr/day work week.

Now you’ve met 2! I hate working 8 hours a day. 0% chance I’ll ever work a schedule of 10-hour days.

Who downvotes this lol?

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#17

Post by boomboomsubban » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:55 AM UTC

justshowpost wrote: post #14

I don't get it. Hours cut by 20% and no wage cut means 25% man-hour production gain for «success». Did they achieve this? ---- Okay, okay, I stand corrected, 10% hours cut requires only +11% to production to stay on par. Still quite much, but not impossible (I think).

Hours were cut by 10%, four nine hour days, and "success" was productivity stayed the same or improved. I haven't seen the full study, but the article claims it succeeded.

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#18

Post by Hydraulix989 » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:55 AM UTC

hellbannedguy wrote: post #15

bpodgursky wrote: post #3

One of the lessons of trying to optimize worker productivity, health and happiness during the industrial revolution is that almost any change was an "overwhelming success" during the trial period, because of some combination of (1) a change of routine, (2) placebo effect -- people like the idea that someone is trying to help them and their mood improves accordingly. Might even be true here (it would be nice!), but in…

I've only met one person who wasen't for a four day 10 hr/day work week. He was a Electrician acquaintance of my father. He was beyond a odd duck. His idea of a fun weekend was painting his house. I'm not kidding. I used to talk to my father a lot over a four day work week. His union almost got it, but they backed out at the last moment. I still think it was a payola thing from the contractors! It just makes so much…

What brings you to Hacker News, if I may ask?

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#19

Post by irrational » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:59 AM UTC

> four nine hour days

How many of you are salaried, yet your hours are tracked? My job is such that I roll in whenever I want, leave whenever I want. As long as I get my work done, nobody cares how long I actually work each day. A few decades ago, my first job out of college did track hours. That was pure hell.

Re: World’s largest ever four day week trial in Iceland ‘overwhelming success’

#20

Post by ncallaway » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 3:00 AM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #10

ashtonkem wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That argument was used against a lot of things that turned out to be a good thing, like the 40 hour work week. What’s your suggesting other than naysaying this trial?

I'm suggesting we have 0 data, and this study is nothing more than an opportunity for people to advocate for the policies they wanted anyway. Which is fine, you can say that 4-day weeks is better b/c it's nicer! That's ok! Just don't try to dress this fluff up as science.

> I'm suggesting we have 0 data

But you’d be wrong, because we now have some data. You can argue the quality of the data is insufficient to draw a conclusion, but it seems… extreme to argue that the data that was collected has 0 value.