Live data from Hacker News

A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

jeffarchibald.ca

151–160 of 323 posts

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#151
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make a valuable distinction; Kahneman did not win the Nobel for psychology, and in fact there is no such thing. But to call psychology a pseudoscience confuses either the definition of science or of psychology. In Thinking, Fast and Slow , Kahneman spends the majority of each chapter outlining scientific studies in detail, many that he personally carried out, making the text a 500 page atlas of counter-examples.

> But to call psychology a pseudoscience confuses either the definition of science or of psychology. It certainly doesn't call into question the definition of science -- that's well-established by a consensus among scientists. The consensus is secure enough that science is now written into law, for example laws meant to prevent Creationism from being taught as science in science classrooms. Here is an excerpt from on…

> falsifiable evidence ("testable against the empirical world")

That's not what falsifiable means.

> I'm a doctor and I've created a revolutionary cure for the common cold. My cure is to shake a dried gourd over the cold sufferer until he gets better. The cure might take a week, but it always works.

Because the common cold has a non-zero mortality rate, you can't say that your cure always works. That statement, taken literally, is provably false, as sooner or later somebody will die even if you're shaking a dried gourd over his body. But lets say that you meant the cure improves the condition of those that suffer from common cold, or that simply we want to find out before anybody dies.

Well, we can do doubly-blind A/B testing and measure several things, like the presence of the associated symptoms, its progression, the average duration and so on. And nowadays, any treatment must beat the placebo effect in order for it to be considered valid.

But lets say that we couldn't determine if this particular cure is valid or not. It would still be falsifiable, because it's related to things that we'll be able to measure in the future, if we can't already - like the autoimmune system's response to this treatment.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#152
post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Most people who are employed full-time are expected to work full-time. Yes, they could leave full-time work and fine new sources of income, but that no longer falls under "just work 30 hours instead".

This doesn't mean that you are suited for 40 hours a week. It just means you have no option but to overwork yourself.

Correct. It's not an option.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#153

I work 40 hours a week at maximum - most weeks I work about 34 to 38 hours. You 80 hours a week guys, what the hell are you doing with your time? Are you divorced? No family? No friends? Is 'disrupting' an industry really that important to you?

My name is Rick and I'm a 80 hour a week guy. I'm 26, single, and have no pets. I have a family and friends, but I'm very transparent about my work habits and priorities as a full-stack engineer. Being so young, I see myself as training to be the person I want to be in the future. The best programmers in the world worked at it relentlessly. Sure, there are variances in the amount that they all worked, and some did it…

Please don't talk this the wrong way but your use of the phrase "full stack" makes it unlikely you are working on hard problems with creative techniques. You're building websites. And you are deluding yourself if you think it is sustainable or meaningful or worth it.

Later "frameworks" and "ninja". Oh dear.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#154

This false dichotomy is seriously getting annoying. If 60 hours is sustainable for you, do it. If only 30 hours is sustainable for you, do that instead. But stop imposing onto others what is right or wrong when there are so many factors at play. Some of my most productive memories are summers studying and working for 12 hours a day, 6 days a week (= 72 hours). I didn't get tired, burned out, or anything. Another summ…

If only 30 hours is sustainable for you, then being employed can be a serious problem. I spent three years with chronic fatigue where I could only work 25 without falling asleep at my desk; fortunately I had a very understanding employer who needed me.

(Also, are you by any chance male, under 35 and have no children?)

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#155
It depends on circumstances. e.g. Right now I'm working 17 hr days on occasion. Knowing that its temporary makes it 100% easier to endure though.

The whole X hours per week greatly underestimates surrounding factors. X hours of what? Hard manual labour? Staring at a CCTV screen?

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#156
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't suggest that introversion has anything whatsoever to do with what you've described. Introversion/extroversion has little or nothing to do with overworking oneself.

I think he may be implying that it is easier to handle the lower levels of social interaction (with friends/family) that come along with working a lot of hours if you're more introverted.

Which has nothing whatsoever to do with whether a person is overworking himself or not.

I'm introverted. There is not and has never been any meaningful connection between that and my limits with respect to working hours.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#157

This false dichotomy is seriously getting annoying. If 60 hours is sustainable for you, do it. If only 30 hours is sustainable for you, do that instead. But stop imposing onto others what is right or wrong when there are so many factors at play. Some of my most productive memories are summers studying and working for 12 hours a day, 6 days a week (= 72 hours). I didn't get tired, burned out, or anything. Another summ…

Indeed... And most of the friends around me who made it big also played it hard. When Broadcom was nowhere several employees number xxx (with xxx less than 300) were, while in crunch-mode, sleeping in their trucks , on the parking lot, to deliver chip plans on time. Stock options have been good for them the day Broadcom was worth $12bn. I've got a few friends who started a 3D-rendering business for TV ads, short movi…

Work smart, not hard.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#158

This false dichotomy is seriously getting annoying. If 60 hours is sustainable for you, do it. If only 30 hours is sustainable for you, do that instead. But stop imposing onto others what is right or wrong when there are so many factors at play. Some of my most productive memories are summers studying and working for 12 hours a day, 6 days a week (= 72 hours). I didn't get tired, burned out, or anything. Another summ…

Indeed... And most of the friends around me who made it big also played it hard. When Broadcom was nowhere several employees number xxx (with xxx less than 300) were, while in crunch-mode, sleeping in their trucks , on the parking lot, to deliver chip plans on time. Stock options have been good for them the day Broadcom was worth $12bn. I've got a few friends who started a 3D-rendering business for TV ads, short movi…

i basically agree with your post but i will add this caveat...

if you're in your mid 30s or older, if you work 80+ hours a week there's a significant chance you will simply keel over and die. that's not the good kind of exit.

in my opinion the strategy is to get the bulk of the hard work out of the way when your body is able to handle it, i.e. 20-35. if you're an entrepreneur, you have to have the foresight to set it up correctly and begin a slow process of tapering down the raw clock hours at 30, so that your mid-late 30s and rest of your life can be spent capitalizing on the insane amount of hours you put in during your 20s and early 30s.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#159
post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My name is Rick and I'm a 80 hour a week guy. I'm 26, single, and have no pets. I have a family and friends, but I'm very transparent about my work habits and priorities as a full-stack engineer. Being so young, I see myself as training to be the person I want to be in the future. The best programmers in the world worked at it relentlessly. Sure, there are variances in the amount that they all worked, and some did it…

Please don't talk this the wrong way but your use of the phrase "full stack" makes it unlikely you are working on hard problems with creative techniques. You're building websites. And you are deluding yourself if you think it is sustainable or meaningful or worth it. Later "frameworks" and "ninja". Oh dear.

You are making some leaps, as well as a few judgments, based on relatively little information. I hope you realize this.

Re: A 60-Hour Work Week is Not a Badge of Honour

#160
From a manager perspective, you wouldn't want an employee working 60+ hours on a regular basis. When actual crunch-time happened, that employee wouldn't have room to work more. You likely wouldn't be able to meet expectations, because your under-staffing problem had been hidden by regularly overworking some employees.
Post reply on HN