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Is 40 hours a week too much?

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Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#211

Post by adave »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #116
shagie wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the "I'm sitting down and writing things that are going to be productive" is likely in the 10-20h/week range, there is still a lot of * Meetings * Mentoring * Answering random questions * Continuing education (Hey, Spring 6.0 was just released, what's in that?) * Support (and being available for support) Those can easily fill in a lot of the 'void'. I can point to 5h/week that are standing 'meetings' where it i…

Most of these conversations seem to come down to weird definitions of "productive time". Most of us managers would consider meetings, mentoring, work-related Slack conversations to be productive time. Yet I read a lot of the comments here where people don't consider anything to be productive time unless they're actively writing code, which ignores the realities of working in a team environment. A better metric might…

I would consider anytime you are thinking about a work issue as productive time. So yes that includes time i am mindlessly browsing HN while my brain is processing information for me to come up with a neat solution to a problem.

But yes managers dont get this when i say i get all my work done during lunch hour.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#212

Post by rrgok »

Karawebnetwork wrote: post #53
randomdata wrote: post #38

Back in the golden age of working from home, when internet service wasn't sufficient for for the barrage of pointless meetings, I was working no more than two hours per day. My coworkers and employers, who all worked in the office at the time, used to joke that I must be an entire team of people. I still only get time for no more than two hours of actual work each day, but now that so many think they should expand to…

It is also very difficult to define "work" and the various definitions contradict each other. I've met programmers who start coding as soon as they hear about a requirement and then spend weeks untangling the web of spaghetti code they have previously written down. I tend to sit down and think before I write even a single line of code. In the office, I used to stare at my screen with headphones on to "look like I was…

I feel the same about stealing billable hours. My creative time happens always in the background, when I doing chores or watching tv series. And then I come to the office and stare at my screen to "look like I was working". I can't help it and sometime my creative time spans 2-3hrs, something I cannot do during staring hours. I feel guilty. But your answer put my mind at ease, thank you.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#213

Post by return_to_monke »

CBarkleyU wrote: post #175
yboris wrote: post #35

4DWW - Four Day Work Week is the future. So many benefits for workers and the company! It's a win-win for many types of companies. Even if it's not a win for all companies, society would benefit greatly by mandating 4 days of 8 hours with no loss of pay as the standard. https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2022/11/15/1136039542/the...

Disagree. Let me introduce you to 5DWWBO6HPD (acronym is subject to change). 5 days, 6 hours. If I dont have any meetings past my 6th hour of being in work-mode (including lunch time), I'm not going to produce anything that won't anger me future-self. The 5DWWBO6HPD also helps you to be actually productive after the 6th hour when the need arises every once in a while and you have to be on "Elon is breathing down my n…

Maybe 5D6HWW?

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#214

Post by incomingpain »

mkl95 wrote: post #7

Many companies think their employees are being productive for 40 hours a week, while it's actually somewhere between 10 and 20, with the rest being a big void. If you are actually doing 40 hours a week you are productive as hell.

>f you are actually doing 40 hours a week you are productive as hell.

This is the 10x engineer. Their peers are working 10 hours, but never get in the flow like they do. Hence the 10x productivity.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#215

Post by chii »

CBarkleyU wrote: post #180
davesque wrote: post #164

I've always felt a bit like an alien from outer space when trying to understand the work habits of modern humans. It seems we spend enough time doing what we think we have to do to survive that it feels like the only thing we actually do. Everything else in our life feels secondary. I'm not sure this is even normal in nature. Seems like a lot of animals spend much of their time just sort of hanging out. Does it hones…

"The lion never says "It took me 15 minutes to hunt the antelope, if I keep at it, I might hunt 4 more down -- wait I could actually take tomorrow off!" -- The lion isnt stupid, he didn't go to business school. Au contraire, lion is much smarter than the MBA, he knows that even if he hunted down 5 antelopes today, he still can't take tomorrow off: He has to build a fridge on his day off. On the day following his day…

That's civilization, and it is the thing that allowed humans to survive better than lions, despite being physically weaker and less hardy.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#216

Post by incomingpain »

Keynes Predicted We Would Be Working 15-Hour Weeks.

https://www.npr.org/2015/08/13/432122637/keynes-predicted-we...

Keynes is right, we should be at around 15 hours per week right now. It's not even a nostradamus prediction, it should have happened. The division of labour, specialization of production and dexterity, and technology has greatly increased productivity.

The answer is globalization, something Keynes didn't think could happen due to diplomacy of his time. So the 'western' world could be at 15 hour weeks but globalization has kept us up high. As these other countries have developed and are starting to industrialize. Pulling people out of poverty and greatly increasing quality of life has been great. It's making us wealthier than ever. We live in a time of abundance.

Shouldn't it be possible to live a life on fewer hours?

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#217

Post by alex_young »

jvanderbot wrote: post #153
alex_young wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, for the most part you can't compare the minimum wage of 100 years ago since it didn't exist, and subsequently excluded most workers until much later. In 1966 the federal minimum wage was amended to include most workers, so a comparison at that point can be made. In 1967 the minimum wage was $1.40, or $10.92 adjusted for inflation. The current minimum wage is $7.25, so in dollar terms the cost of goods, especial…

What I'm saying is comparing wages is meaningless. If you compare what a month of work gets you in USA, it's astounding compared to what it go you 150 years ago. Imagine buying a beat up car, internet connected computer, cell phone, refrigerator, etc. That's where the productivity growth went: Into better stuff, not into bigger piles of shells.

I don’t disagree that the quality of many goods is much higher, but when you start looking at what the lowest quartile can actually afford to consume the results are pretty starkly worse than they have been in our relatively recent past.

A huge chunk of lower income is dedicated to housing, to an extent that many cannot actually afford housing at all.

The gains of our productivity have been distributed in a most unequal manner.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#218

Post by tluyben2 »

sbf501 wrote: post #140
tluyben2 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you go to the office because you need to or want to? Seems there is some difference there.

Why does that even matter? Or do you just assume everyone is a Javascript programmer? If I say "need" people will tell me it's my fault and to change jobs. If I say "want" people will tell me it's my fault and to change jobs.

I don’t assume anyone is a javascript programmer by choice really but anyway. Of course it matters; if you want to be in the office, why count your travel hours? Your choice. If you need to be in the office, that’s another case.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#219

Post by tluyben2 »

notacop31337 wrote: post #158
sbf501 wrote: post #65

8-to-5 is 45 hours a week. I'm still in the office, even for lunch. Considering travel, it bumps up to 50 hrs/week. I hate how this 10-hour "work tax" is always dismissed as part of 40 hour work week.

I'm at the stage now where if a company required me in the office, the surcharge I'd be asking on top of my wage (30% would do it) would be so hilarious that it would be insulting, but in my mind, that's kinda the point.

I think the company should just count the travel hours as work hours if office presence is mandatory.

Re: Is 40 hours a week too much?

#220

Post by tluyben2 »

65 wrote: post #184
innocentoldguy wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I will only take remote jobs. I got sick of spending two hours a day in bumper-to-bumper traffic.

You could try living in a city where you can commute via train. 1 hour on a train is significantly different than 1 hour driving a car.

Still 1 hour of your life gone. Might be better by train but why do it at all if not needed?
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