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[URL="http://www.alternet.org/visions/154518/why_we_have_to_go_back_to_a_40-hour_work_week_to_keep_our_sanity/?page=entire"]Why We Have to Go Back to a 40-Hour Work Week to Keep Our Sanity | Visions | AlterNet[/URL]
Excellent piece!
The bottom line is that routinely putting in 50 or 60 hours is not only unhealthy, it's unproductive and therefore makes no business sense.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Being salaried management I work anywhere from 35-50 hours a week depending on what's going on with my staff, but I enjoy my work. I will admit that when you have young kids 40 hours seems a lot, but that's worked for many years and I was lucky enough to stay at 40 when mine were young. The trend of longer hours today is a function of the economy, with less expense to pay overtime than hire more people and pay them benefits.
The bigger issue I think is commute times, with people forced to buy homes far from work because of the cost or lack of nice residential areas near business centers, that can easily add two hours to the day, making it 10-11 hours away from home if you have the typical 1 hour lunch. I have always tried to manage this by starting as early as possible. If I leave home at 5:30-6am everyone else is asleep anyway so they don't miss me, but I get home earlier and have more time with the family in the afternoon/evening.
Being a single male, I have to work more than 40 hours a week to live what my parents would define as a middle class lifestyle. As a 20-something, I work more than most because that's what it costs to afford a 40-hour a week lifestyle 20 years ago. People have no effin clue. And according to society, if I'm not driving a nice car and living in a respectable part of the community, I'm a waste of a human being. Wonderful society we've constructed... So yea, 40 hours a week just doesn't cut it for much of the younger folks. And since so many of my peers would jump at the opportunity to work for peanuts to take my job, I've always got that to worry about...
I wholeheartedly agree with this article.
From '05-'06 and '07-'08, I spent a combined three years at an employer that had me on a standard 40-hr/week schedule.
I worked the swing-shift and started at either 3PM or 4PM and ended at either 11PM or 12AM.
This type of scheduling actually worked much better on my body.
I dropped from 350lbs to about 170 due to being able to follow a set workout routine after getting off of work.
Commonly, it was;
-Sleep/do whatever in the day time.
-Work during the night-time.
-Head to the gym/do other physical stuff late-night/early AM.
Rinse, repeat.
However, accounts got lost on this job and I also foolishly bit off more than I could chew by taking on a supervisory role during my last few months there.
Sadly, all jobs I've had since that one have me putting in either very few hours or too many hours.
Also, I find myself starting and ending work at varied times of the day.
One day, I start at 6AM and end at 6PM.
Another day I could be starting at 7PM and ending at 4AM.
I gained weight back despite efforts to counter and adapt.
And overall, I feel my head is spinning in some form each day.
In my state, a "right-to-work" state, an employer can require you to work 7 days a week! Sure would be a lot more jobs here if we had the 6 day a week standard of other states.
I think whoever came up with the 40 hr workweek is an insane person. why we devote 1/3 of our lives to work at something we don't like is ridiculous
Imagine that there was a time where coming up with the 40 hour work week was a huge victory for the working class! Oh, wait...
But, yeah- for a lot of jobs, I swear that they make people stay for 40 hours because that's what we do, not because there is actually 40 hours worth of work to be done each week.
I have know places where you are limited to 37.5 hours and they will not allow over time or extra time. If you work any more you get in trouble unless you clear it with management.
It's another wonderful way of saving money, Recession style.
I'd would have loved overtime at my last job working for someone but they were very cheap about the hours we could work to keep it lean.
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