Live data from Hacker News

Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

phys.org

31–40 of 62 posts

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#31
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>2+ jobs with minimal responsibilities or expectations I was never lucky to find such jobs in my life. Every job I had enough on my plate to not have enough time and energy for a second job. Plus, in my EU country working 2 full time jobs at the same time is impossible since employers can ask to see your social security contributions history before you start work to make sure it matches what you said in your resume,…

> if you get caught later, they can sue you for it if they find out Is it illegal to have 2 jobs in your country?

usually every contract for a job will have some clause like working hours etc. You would be breaking that clause.

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#32
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If capitalism cares about anything, it's economic growth. It's unclear to me how half-assing two jobs is good for economic growth.

Capitalism doesn't care about anything other than personal profit. Half-assing two jobs might not be good for economic growth, but it's the essence of capitalism - earn the most you can for doing the least you can get away with and vice versa, extract the most labor you can while paying the least you can get away with.

Capitalism is free markets, private property, voluntary exchange of labor, capital accumulation, etc.

What you're complaining about is greed. Greed has existed throughout human history (and probably before). Greed is found wherever there are people (and probably animals), including in non-capitalist arrangements.

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#33
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>2+ jobs with minimal responsibilities or expectations I was never lucky to find such jobs in my life. Every job I had enough on my plate to not have enough time and energy for a second job. Plus, in my EU country working 2 full time jobs at the same time is impossible since employers can ask to see your social security contributions history before you start work to make sure it matches what you said in your resume,…

> if you get caught later, they can sue you for it if they find out Is it illegal to have 2 jobs in your country?

Netherlands:

- may not work more than 60 hours in a single week, and not more than 48 hrs/week on average

- may not work more than 12 hours in a single shift

- must rest for at least 11 consecutive hours every day, and at least 36 consecutive hours every week

- stricter rules than this for pregnant women and minors

https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/werktijden/vraag-en...

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#34
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism doesn't care about anything other than personal profit. Half-assing two jobs might not be good for economic growth, but it's the essence of capitalism - earn the most you can for doing the least you can get away with and vice versa, extract the most labor you can while paying the least you can get away with.

Capitalism is free markets, private property, voluntary exchange of labor, capital accumulation, etc. What you're complaining about is greed. Greed has existed throughout human history (and probably before). Greed is found wherever there are people (and probably animals), including in non-capitalist arrangements.

[deleted]

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#35
post #30
post #2

If you work remotely, a good cure for boredom is working 2+ jobs with minimal responsibilities or expectations. Spinning plates, keeping a mediocre output for keeping the job, is a great wealth and boredom fix.

I wish employers would better encourage and reward those who put enormous effort into their job. Far too often you just get dragged along with a promise of a promotion down the road. Then its a 5% increase. Meanwhile the sub-par performers collecting the average salary are getting better compensated for their time. This is one reason why entrepreneurship can be appealing. Not only is there potential reward for hard w…

I think there's a caveat with the current market.

Many Big Tech companies are in a phase of pre/post-layoff hunger games. Meanwhile, more and more AI startups are appearing, with lucrative-looking equity packages.

In both cases, a pragmatist could reasonably conclude that "working hard to keep the high-paying day job" is a better strategy than "going into the jungle and start a startup."

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#36
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism doesn't care about anything other than personal profit. Half-assing two jobs might not be good for economic growth, but it's the essence of capitalism - earn the most you can for doing the least you can get away with and vice versa, extract the most labor you can while paying the least you can get away with.

Capitalism is free markets, private property, voluntary exchange of labor, capital accumulation, etc. What you're complaining about is greed. Greed has existed throughout human history (and probably before). Greed is found wherever there are people (and probably animals), including in non-capitalist arrangements.

I wasn't complaining about greed, not in this comment anyway. I was merely describing the nature of free markets with supply & demand as its driving principle.

Those are the rules, but employers despise getting beaten at their own game.

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#37
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you perform well enough that your boss doesn't notice, clearly it's providing the value you're getting paid for it? And getting 2-3 jobs out of a person is a multiplier to growth in theory, since they augment more other workers labour.

that's like saying "if you steal from someone and he doesnt notice it, clearly he doesn't need it" If you think about this a bit more deeply, you realize "wait...a second"

When the job market is bad, these companies will not even slightly hesitate before demanding so much work that you need to put in 10, 20, even 30+ hours per week of unpaid overtime. They want to act like amoral money-extraction engines but they want to be treated like well-behaved moral agents.

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#38
post #18
post #2

If you work remotely, a good cure for boredom is working 2+ jobs with minimal responsibilities or expectations. Spinning plates, keeping a mediocre output for keeping the job, is a great wealth and boredom fix.

I have several things to say about this: 1. Jobs with minimal responsibilities pay minimal salary 2. Influencers that promoted overemployment during Covid are now unemployed and trying to survive by selling informational products 3. If a scammer offers you a deal to scam someone, in reality the most likely victim of the scam is you

> Jobs with minimal responsibilities pay minimal salary

Jobs with minimal printed responsibilities pay minimal salaries. In practice, things are quite different.

And the original overemployed guy doesn’t have anything to sell, lol.

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#39
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>2+ jobs with minimal responsibilities or expectations I was never lucky to find such jobs in my life. Every job I had enough on my plate to not have enough time and energy for a second job. Plus, in my EU country working 2 full time jobs at the same time is impossible since employers can ask to see your social security contributions history before you start work to make sure it matches what you said in your resume,…

> if you get caught later, they can sue you for it if they find out Is it illegal to have 2 jobs in your country?

Germany: It is part of my contract that my employer knows about my other jobs and they don't interfere with my actual job. E.g. having a side business that you maintain outside your working ours is fine.

You also can't have two full-time jobs without you violating labor laws or defrauding your employer. Since if you aren't defrauding one employer you would have to work 16 hours a day, which you can not do for 5 days a week in a row. And there is no way to actually hide that your are doing this. Employers are forced to pay certain taxes for employing you which can't be payed by two different companies for the same thing.

Re: Suppressing boredom at work hurts future productivity

#40
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you get caught later, they can sue you for it if they find out Is it illegal to have 2 jobs in your country?

Netherlands: - may not work more than 60 hours in a single week, and not more than 48 hrs/week on average - may not work more than 12 hours in a single shift - must rest for at least 11 consecutive hours every day, and at least 36 consecutive hours every week - stricter rules than this for pregnant women and minors https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/werktijden/vraag-en...

This seems more like a limit on employers than workers.
Post reply on HN