I’m not sacrificing shit, asshole. We fucking deserve a 4 day work week after decades of skyrocketing productivity and shit wages.
We’ve been sacrificing every time we get a “raise” or a “cost of living adjustment” that doesn’t even come close to keeping up with inflation.
Productivity has been on a rocket to the moon since the beginning of the industrial revolution, so centuries.
Every time I see any discussion about a 4 day work week, it’s always the same. Discussion is focused around what changes/sacrifices the workers are willing to make to accomplish this. Fuck that noise, nothing should be sacrificed. Your pay shouldn’t change, your leaves shouldn’t change, nothing should change. Fucking capitalist mentality bullshit.
“Studies show productivity increases with 4-day/32h work week”
“Ok but we’ll only pay for 32 hours.”
“I literally just said it makes us more productive. Maybe you should pay us for 48 hours”
But you won’t have suffered as much for it, so good you really earn it?
I want to believe you’re joking
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Teleworking was possible in the 90s. It took goddamned covid for the stonewall of telework being “impossible to manage” to topple.
Yet we still have corporate-backed talking heads doing everything they can to convince us to the contrary, and there’s a significant amount bootlicking morons that lap it up like the pet dogs they are, which ducks it up for the rest of us. “You see Steve? He works 60 hours a week for minimum wage with a smile, you all should be more like Steve,” nevermind Steve has the IQ of a grapefruit and has zero life outside of work.
Belgium already has this, and Portugal is implementing it.
really sick that at least half of the country hears about 4 day work weeks and starts crunching the numbers for their overlords
i have to assume it’s pure bitterness. it’s a rite of passage to waste your life from 20-70 and fuck you if it’s any easier for you
Not to mention a complete absence of service/retail voices.
The only way they could afford that is going to ten hours a day over 4 days- or the company has to increase their hourly wages to compensate.
But of course no one is actually advocating a 4 day for retail and service. It’s for office workers who want to go shopping on Friday too
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My recycling center closes at 3 and obviously isn’t open on weekends. 🫠
…. The irony of your complaint….
And the entitlement.
It’s delicious.
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I have worked in service/retail, and this argument doesn’t make a lot of sense. Most service/retail is actually 7-day weeks, but the workers average out to 5-day weeks with rotating shifts etc.
All that would have to happen is the workers now average out to 4-day weeks, with a similar level of pay (which is what the 4-day week advocates are asking for).
The 4-day week isn’t about office workers, it’s about everyone.
All that would have to happen is the workers now average out to 4-day weeks, with a similar level of pay (which is what the 4-day week advocates are asking for).
You’re forgetting that retail and most service workers aren’t salaried in the US. They’re paid hourly. And most are living paycheck to paycheck-or very close to it.
In order for to not loose on pay, either the company has to increase their rates (lol. Not gonna happen,) or they have to work more hours across the four days to make up for the lost day.
And many retail workers are already do 12’s and 16’s to eek out overtime.
Edit: To put this another way, OT starts at 40 hrs. Most retail/service managers do everything they can to keep their employees at less than 40/week. OT is a very big sink, it’s cheaper to hire more employees than, if one can, than it is to pay staff OT.
If you reduce the threshold to 32, that’s still going to be true- on the 5/2 week day-weekend rotation it only helps the weeked- moving hours to them. It doesn’t matter to managment whose working that shift- only that it gets worked.
So, now, you’ve got an entire sector’s worth (and the largest economic sector at that) of people who are being shorted hours- and we all know that corpos are not going to be increasing wages to match: that would be a 25%increase in wages- and not just for the full time employee. Most large companies will dictate the wages for everyone at a given position.
Alternatively, they can just pay time and a half for the last 8, which might be only a 10% loss.
Regardless, retail/service sectors won’t really see any changes. This is probably true because many are working 20+ hours of overtime at low wages anyhow. Those companies have already decided paying adequate wages, and attracting employees is “too expensive”
Right, the point of the 4 day work week is that it will become the new standard for full time work, rather than the current 5 days.
So all your points are kind of moot, as they will ideally be addressed through cultural changes, employee expectations, or regulation.
No…. My point is that your “ideal” world doesn’t exist. The real world includes Walmart, Kroger, Cargill, Amazon and a thousand other companies owned and ran by assholes who only really care about profits.
I think most of us realise that corporations will not do this out of the kindness of their hearts. Doesn’t mean we should just say “Fuck it, never going to happen”. We should demand better.
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*eke out overtime. No need to be surprised about it by saying “eek!”
I can’t deny the truth of this, it’s true that only a relatively small group of jobs could realistically implement this. You can’t make a delivery truck go 20% faster, or get 20% more customers in your store at a given time. Many such jobs scale productivity with time by their nature (to some extent). While I absolutely think those workers deserve the same pay for less work at the very least, the reality is that no company will do it. There’s no benefit for them.
No, no sacrifices are acceptable. Workers generally get taken advantage of in the US. I think everyone is tired of being taken advantage of. It’s time for businesses to actually treat people better.
Yes, we are tired of being exploited.
having fewer vacation days, 16%; having a longer commute, 12%; taking a pay cut, 10%; or taking a step back in their careers
Yeah right, what are employers sacrificing again? What a BS article
Fewer vacation days? Heck no. If I wanted to burn vacation to get a 4 day week, I’d do it already.
Longer commute? Heck no. WFH or I walk.
Pay cut? Heck no. You KNOW that 99% of people will be just as productive with a 4 day work week as a 5 day, so why take less money for the same output?
Taking a step back in career? Not like I’m shooting for being a VP or anything, so I guess I don’t care if I don’t get promoted to senior middle manager meeting organizer, so who cares on that one.
If neoliberalism didn’t completely decouple wages from productivity 50 years ago, workers would already be making the same wages for a ~3 day work week.
So yes, they can absolute go fuck themselves. The only way a realignment will occur is if workers organize, unionize, and demand it at a national level.
What happened in 1974?
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Ah, so that’s where all the surplus money from workers’ productivity has been going
Same time and place here too!
Oh thanks, nice to see I’m not the only one who’s had that thought
Edit: damn 1971 seems like the year that changed the world
The real question is what kept happening after about 1980 and the answer is John Hinckley Jr. missed.
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Anything labeled “money” or “finance” or “CNBC” is like this.
I would literally do any of those for a four-day week. It would be nicer if my job just sliced a day off, but since I know that’s unlikely, I’ll make sacrifices to get it here quicker.
This attitude is exactly why workers have continously been getting fucked more and more
The attitude of being willing to compromise to get what I want, rather than waiting until my perfect conditions are met? I just don’t think it’s a reasonable expectation for people to stop thinking like that. I use compromise every day of my life - I used it ten minutes ago, to choose a slightly damaged monitor for less money over a brand-new, more expensive one.
I am of the mind that the faster we can get a few companies offering a four-day week, the faster it will become standard - or at least common. We saw it happen with WFH: Companies now have to expect to compete with offers that include remote work, so they either have to provide it as well, or improve other parts of their offer.
That’s not compromising, it’s groveling at their feet begging them to give you the slightest bit of respect, a tiny little crumb of the ever growing profits.
What an outrageous take. I am making an exchange that makes me happier. I get something; they get something. Otherwise I sit and wait and fume and get nothing.
I can want one thing and accept that my current reality won’t provide it to me without being an enemy of the cause. I’m genuinely shocked that such a hardline, absolutist mindset is the prevalent one in this community.
Unless you’re one of the very few people who’s pay has been even close to keeping up with inflation, they’ve already taken more from you, and you haven’t gotten shot in return. Don’t give up more for no reason just in the name of “compromise”. The bare minimum is wage increases and better work life balance
Good luck saying that to your boss and expecting them to capitulate.
Man the concept of a union is going to blow your mind
I know what a union is. Unless you’re about start one, recruit people, and bargain collectively with your employer, I suggest you start somewhere more realistic.
Fuck no, no sacrifices. Productivity is up, wealth is up, people should be paid more for their time and have more time to spare.
Yea this article is painting that the people are the problem here. Sacrifice the super rich CEOs instead.
Sacrifice I’m willing to make: sacrificing the CEO to the Old Gods.
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Jokes on them. I barely give three days worth of effort in my five-day week.
I got you beat and maybe do a total of 12 hours of work to get paid 40. Only shit deal is was wfh doing first years of covid. And was 4 days a week, but management stuck their heads up their area and decided to make us 5 days week.
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Exactly. I read the headline and was like: no, that’s what corporations want - for you to sacrifice pay or something else so they don’t lose out.
Most corps have posted record profits these past few years - they can afford to let their workers work a day less without reducing their pay, they just don’t want to admit it.
I want permanent wfh and I’d take a pay cut if I never had to worry about it again.
My first sacrifice: the billionaire CEO
If we pass a law forcing employers to pay for commute time, I’m sure all sides will want 4-day work weeks.
If they’re paying commune they’ll probably want 2x20 hour shifts
I’m in.
That or go for WFH for eligible jobs
We were soooo close… Then big real-estate started losing value so they had to justify the offices somehow.
They’d either have to support remote work or pay is enough to live within a few minutes of the office.
I have an hour-long drive because that’s where I can afford to live.
Working more than 3 days a week is barbaric and unnecessary.
Working 4 days would be OK if it was only for 6 hours each day. Although 8 hours for 3 days a week would be better even if they’re the same hours
Productivity has increased disproportialy to workers pay the last 40 years. Working less days and less hours is only fair considering that most of the benefits went to the employers side. 4 day/ 20 hour weeks should be the norm. And people should be able to work from home for as long as possible to avoid commuting and the barbaric micromanagement of the low/middle admins
edit: gramar
edit: grammar
Workinhlg
To be fair, that’s not grammar :p
ty
I was more going for a 15 hour work week…
My team at work recently instituted a “flex time” Friday policy. Basically, as long as we’re maintaining productivity we aren’t expected to work on Fridays. A lot of us still work half days to keep up but it’s nice to know that if I work a little more earlier in the week I can just take a three day weekend.
Ah interesting. I too have instituted a flex time Friday.
So far my company hasn’t seemed to notice
I dread the day my manager calls me in to talk about the flex time Friday
Eh as long as the tickets keep on chugging along, there should be no problem.
My boss doesn’t work on Fridays and I’m starting to push for this flex setup. I’ll check my emails and do the hour or two of work that might come in those days, but I want to do it from home while getting my household chores done before the weekend.
This is the way to go. What’s crazy is your productivity and efficiency is probably the same or better since you can have a softer reset with the weekend.
Fuck that sounds nice, I’m trying to sell my boss on changing to a 4-10h day work week, and he hasn’t said No yet, so we might be getting somewhere
FWIW every study on the subject shows that, for typical office work, four 10hour work days is not more productive than four 8hour work days, and both are at least 90% as productive as five 8hour workdays. People tend to fill the time with the production they need to get done.
Unless you’re working on a production line in manufacturing.
What is stopping your employer from giving you so much work that you are forced to work on Fridays so your employer only has to pretend the policy works?
We use a bottom-up work planning system (scrum). We have a backlog of work items that we (the people doing the work) assign point values to based on how complex we think the work is. Management knows about how many points of work we can complete in a 2 week period, and they decide what items they want done this work period based on their priorities. If we don’t get something done, it slips to the next 2 week sprint. If we get everything done and still have time, we pull additional items from the backlog. So long as the number of points we complete every 2 weeks stays relatively steady they are happy.
I know it’s hard to believe, because I’ve worked other places where it wasn’t like this. But some employers really do respect their employees and try to treat them with dignity and respect.
I will say that occasionally we have looming deadlines and more work to get done than we can normally do. When that happens we will be asked to dig in and work extra hours to get things done. It sucks but it’s also pretty rare. I’ve been with the company for going on 9 years and I think it has happened 3 times, for limited periods, and afterwards management will make it up by giving us time off as compensation. Most of us like working here enough that we don’t mind the occasional brief crunch.
That’s not how most jobs that can offer “flex time” function. The employer literally cannot just “invent” work to do.
It’s not mentioned much but there is a huge psychological boost to working 4 days a week
5 days a week feels like a week but 4 days only feels like half a week
I work in a role that’s 12h shift. With an average of 2.8 shifts a week when stat and holidays are accounted for.
I dread the day that I can’t do the nights anymore and have to move into a 4 or 5 day a week role. With the nights sometimes it doesn’t even feel like I lost the whole day on each end of a set.
They specifically don’t want a psychological boost. They want us beat down, exhausted and miserable so we can’t fight them.
The real problem is, how many politicians and capitalists are we willing to sacrifice before we get this 4-day mandate.
That sounds like a solution, not a problem. I’m all for it.
It’s more like: How many do we have to keep. The less the better.
A lot of U.S. factory jobs are 12 hour days, alternating between 4 day on, 3 days off, 3 days on, 4 days off. Probably not what most people are thinking of though.
My last cushy office job was 4.5 days/week about half the time (beginning of the quarter was 4.5 day weeks, end of quarter was 5 day week), and seemed to work well. Some stupid workaholic assholes would complain about the 4.5 day work weeks though.
In my experience, productivity per hour increases the less hours people work. Workaholics are just trying to stay away from their family, or don’t know what to do with themselves in their free-time, IMO.
12s do make sense in Healthcare where every handoff is an opportunity to miss important information. For instance if you forget to mention all the specifics of all your patients injuries after a car wreck, the next nurse might not realize their sinuses are cracked and just go ahead and insert that nasogastric feeding tube into their brain.
3 handoffs a day instead of 2 is 1.5 as many chances to make an error like that.
That said, 2x12s a week instead of 3 sounds lovely.
Ahhhhhh, but one is less likely to make an error when they’re tired. In sure that even nursing could rotate to a 3x shift per day cycle and the wheels wouldn’t fall off.
Honestly I’d settle for making sure the doctors hand off q12h. They often work 48 hour shifts with even more disastrous possibilities.
I’d sacrifice a couple of my daily hours of slacking off for a 4-day work week.
I probably only get about three, maybe three and a half, days of work a week anyway.
We don’t actually have anything much to do and yet the company has just expanded the department.
There was a story about a guy in Google who, as it turned out, worked only an hour a day, and the rest of the time he worked on his passion project. The thing is, he did everything he was supposed to do, every metric was OK, all the tickets were closed and everyone was happy.
When it was posted on one IT forum, the comments were full of people accusing him of stealing money from the company and how he should be fired into the sun. All of those commenters were basically a regular IT guys. The lack of class solidarity is astonishing.As the old saying goes, companies always want to fire the IT staff because everything’s fine and nothing ever goes wrong.
If you’re doing your job properly, then you basically never do anything.
Yesterday I did literally nothing, except at 4:55 p.m. somebody rang up because the spam filter had trapped an email that he wanted. So I was in work for 8 hours in order to fix an issue that took 2 minutes to fix.
But the company know how often I receive calls, but they’ve been around for decades now, so I suspect that they probably worked out back in the 90s that firing IT staff because they that much work to do, just results in them needing to hire more IT staff later on.
When I was younger, I worked as an IT guy on a printing factory, we had 24 hours shifts. The day was a usual IT shit, and at nights we did a little bit of maintenance but mostly we were on standby to fix IT stuff in the factory, most of the printing was done on the nights so the fresh press goes out in the morning. Mostly we were paid handsomely to play WOW the whole night, and once in a blue moon go to the factory floor and reboot something or repair a patchcord or reinstall a memory stick or something.
Then the company got merged with the other media company, they took over the factory, and their first decision was to remove night shifts, because why do you need to pay those IT wankers, they don’t do anything most of the time. Of course most of us left but they had their own IT guys and everything was great, they were able to conserve so much money on salary, until one day one of the computers run out of disk space in the middle of the night and that clogged the whole damn factory, and since all the IT was home asleep, nobody was able to clear the cache, so nothing got printed, everyone involved lost millions, and the whole company was ultimately bankrupted because of this.
Mmmmmh the sweet taste of polish on one’s tongue
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Inb4 “if you only want to work for 4 of 5 days then you must only want 80% pay and oh by the way we still expect you to come in all 5 days anyways because corporate culture or something.”
The workplace is a big family after all. You surely don’t want to only spend 3 days a week with your family do you??
We can do that but dang, we’ll have to get rid of health insurance. Oh, you want health insurance? Darn, we just can’t see any possible way to do both.
Funnily enough that would push a lot more people into the Healthcare Marketplace (Obamacare) which is often better than healthcare offered through work, depending on your circumstances. Then we might get more people asking why we don’t just switch to socialized medicine and be done with it.
