Why Sweden Is Shifting To A 6-Hour Workday

Megalith

Megalith

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What are your thoughts on getting rid of the standard 8-hour workday? Do you think we would ever adopt this due to our “workaholic culture” in the US?

"I think the eight-hour workday is not as effective as one would think," says Linus Feldt, CEO of Stockholm-based app developer Filimundus. "To stay focused on a specific work task for eight hours is a huge challenge. In order to cope, we mix in things and pauses to make the workday more endurable. At the same time, we are having it hard to manage our private life outside of work. We want to spend more time with our families, we want to learn new things or exercise more. I wanted to see if there could be a way to mix these things."
 
Give a man a day to do a days work and he will take all day.

Tell him he can go home as soon as that day's work is done and he'll be gone by lunchtime.
 
In the salaried world of US corporate employment, there is an expectation that you work a minimum of 60 hours a week. That means 10 hour days if you're not willing (and able to decline) working on the weekend. If anyone in the department is working less than that, either they get more dumped on their desk or rounds of layoffs ensue until everyone's grinding their lives away to keep their career alive.
 
Looks like it might be time to move back to Sweden...

The work culture here in the US is untenable.
 
The more you are paid, generally, the more you are expected to work ... the USA has already adopted the 6 hour week for low paid employees because it qualifies them as part time workers who receive fewer benefits and cost a much lower burden rate ...

since many USA workers are salaried there is no benefit to holding them to specific hours (as long as they accomplish their tasks) ... however, most have a task load or set of responsibilities that is likely impossible to accomplish in a 6 hour day or 30 hour week
 
This kind of change might positively affect overall health. Less stress might mean less diabetes, heart problems,etc.
 
kbrickley said:
The more you are paid, generally, the more you are expected to work ... the USA has already adopted the 6 hour week for low paid employees because it qualifies them as part time workers who receive fewer benefits and cost a much lower burden rate ...
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Which means they need to hold two jobs for 12 hours a day with no benefits. And then they get dumped on by conservatives for being too lazy to make the time to go to school for skills to get a real job.
 
Tyler-Durden said:
What is the rationale for no editing in this section only?
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I would like to know this as well.


I work 8 hours + 1 hour of overtime every weekday. Being able to work just 6 a day and still be able to keep the same job would be nice.
 
I believe we should be working towards making humans do less work. That should always be our goal. Humans will naturally do other creative things if given the opportunity. The idea that poor people are lazy and that's what makes them poor is a fallacy.
 
evilsofa said:
In the salaried world of US corporate employment, there is an expectation that you work a minimum of 60 hours a week. That means 10 hour days if you're not willing (and able to decline) working on the weekend. If anyone in the department is working less than that, either they get more dumped on their desk or rounds of layoffs ensue until everyone's grinding their lives away to keep their career alive.
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Which is why i'm not salaried because i rather not get screwed.
 
daglesj said:
Give a man a day to do a days work and he will take all day.

Tell him he can go home as soon as that day's work is done and he'll be gone by lunchtime.
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Exactly, in North American people are driven into the ground by work, let people be happier and they may be happier at work which often also leads to more productivity..

McDork said:
This kind of change might positively affect overall health. Less stress might mean less diabetes, heart problems,etc.
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For certain, think of the companies that cover health benefits for employee's, here in Calgary Alberta it seems most jobs want that work / life balance, offer programs, gym memberships and other things to keep you healthier vs sitting at your desk for 8-10 hours a day and being stressed and having no time for your life.

bloodhawke83 said:
sounds stupid, can't fix stupid.
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How is this stupid? So your all for working people into the ground, giving them no work, life balance...

I would be all for a 10 hour a day, 4 day work week, but being in I.T as we all know, we work a 365 day year 24/7...
 
When I've worked salaried jobs, I would love this as I'm generally more efficient and done with my work faster.

When I'm hourly I utterly loath getting screwed out of hours. I want a minimum of 50 hours if I'm on the clock.

I don't envy anyone trying to figure out how to make a law that lowers the work day without allowing business owners to completely dick over employees.
 
Megalith said:
What are your thoughts on getting rid of the standard 8-hour workday? Do you think we would ever adopt this due to our “workaholic culture” in the US?

"I think the eight-hour workday is not as effective as one would think," says Linus Feldt, CEO of Stockholm-based app developer Filimundus. "To stay focused on a specific work task for eight hours is a huge challenge. In order to cope, we mix in things and pauses to make the workday more endurable. At the same time, we are having it hard to manage our private life outside of work. We want to spend more time with our families, we want to learn new things or exercise more. I wanted to see if there could be a way to mix these things."
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Uhh...Megalith...Hello?

We already have sub-6-hour-workdays in the USA. Workplaces love them because it means they don't have to pay employees healthcare expenses....so strictly speaking the USA isn't doing it for employees health and well being...they're doing it to pay employees even less.
 
I saw this a little while ago and was informed this is not really a movement in Sweden. I'd find a new job if this happened because with the cost of me traveling to work, I would start to loose a lot of money.
 
evilsofa said:
In the salaried world of US corporate employment, there is an expectation that you work a minimum of 60 hours a week. That means 10 hour days if you're not willing (and able to decline) working on the weekend. If anyone in the department is working less than that, either they get more dumped on their desk or rounds of layoffs ensue until everyone's grinding their lives away to keep their career alive.
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This shit can't be legal. Can't you sue? Sounds easy enough to produce evidence.

10 hour working days are very unproductive in some fields. I know I can't stay focused for more than a couple of hours. Most of the actual work I do in one or two bursts. The rest is a waste of everyone's time.

Zarathustra[H];1041891289 said:
Looks like it might be time to move back to Sweden...

The work culture here in the US is untenable.
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You just miss burning churches over the weekend :D
 
6hrs, wtf. Pretty soon they will just hand out money for people to stay home.
 
I live in Sweden and we are not shifting to 6 hour work days. The left wing party (formarly the communist party) have been asking for it for decades but no other party agrees with them. Apart from a handful of work places 8 hour days is still the norm.
 
dgz said:
This shit can't be legal. Can't you sue? Sounds easy enough to produce evidence.
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Any American lawyer will be happy to discuss how long their working hours are with you at length for $400 per hour!
 
I am salaried and love what I do. I enjoy the fact that I can focus on getting the work done and not worry about how many hours I have in or if I have to leave because I have to many hours in. The customer is the focus and what they need and yet, I still find plenty of time to do other things, such as distance running.
 
I'd take a six hour day even if it meant a 20% pay cut.

I've been looking around for jobs that offer shorter hours, but all programming jobs are full-time (8+ hours per day). The only jobs that offer part-time work tend to be the lower paid jobs (admin, shop work, etc), and that would be one hell of a pay cut. Even then I'm still considering it because I value free time far more than money.
 
Tyler-Durden said:
... more time to spend...

What is the rationale for no editing in this section only?
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Gabriel said:
I would like to know this as well.


I work 8 hours + 1 hour of overtime every weekday. Being able to work just 6 a day and still be able to keep the same job would be nice.
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This has been explained by Kyle and Steve many times over. This section of the forum is much more active than other sections of the forum. They are afraid that by having the ability to edit in this section people will come into a discussion, post something for no other reason than to start a flame war, then turn around and edit their post afterwards. By leaving this section itself as none editable if / when somebody post something for no other reason than to piss off others and start an argument that post is still there and the person can't claim that they didn't do anything wrong. Imagine something like the new topics that already get fan boys into fights, now imagine somebody being able to make a statement just to piss people off, then being able to remove it once they get people riled up. That could lead to much worse fighting that there already is. That is not something that they want to risk dealing with. Sure if can be a pain at times, but anyone who post on a regular basis knows they can't edit and just deal with it.
 
^ I don't think later quotes change after OP edit, so that seems like more trouble than it's worth and the restriction seems more annoying than useful.
 
I have a scheduled "9 hour" work day but I'm only there for 6 hours.

1 hour lunch
1 hour gym time
1 hour leave early because I got all of my shit done and my bosses reward those who put in a lot of effort.
 
I think its a great idea for many professions.
More quality time = happier people = higher productivity + improved creativity.
And less time keeping the offices running so a bit of money saved there.
It will also benefit the local economy more because more people will be out enjoying themselves.

But its clearly not going to work for a whole stack of professions and if overtime has to be paid after 6hrs as a blanket standard, there will be a lot of problems.
 
Make work. Getting 10 hours less out of a 40hr/wk employee means you have to employ 33% more people to get the same work done. Of course the cost of wages and benefits go up 33% which pump up the product price which will get a reaction of less product sold meaning more unemployment. Adding to the viscous cycle of more non-solution solutions.

But like someone already said. Can't fix stupid.
 
sc0tty8 said:
6hrs, wtf. Pretty soon they will just hand out money for people to stay home.
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It's a well known fact that over time worker efficiency keeps going up (in larger part due to technology), but workers see very little of the efficiency gain in rewards to themselves. All of the rewards from these productivity boosts go to upper management and investors.

Now, many might say that a large part of these productivity gains are due to shareholder investments in technology, and as such it is only fair for the benefits of the productivity gains to go to shareholders.

While I mostly agree here, this poses a real big problem.

As more and more jobs are automated and able to be performed by machines, if we keep this mantra that shareholders invest in technology to boost productivity, and keep all the rewards of that productivity boost, it will eventually result in a massive underclass unable to find work, and a minuscule super-class holding all the wealth.

We've already seen this on a small scale, and it promises to only continue in this way.

John Maynard Keynes famously predicted his grandchildren would only need to work 15 hour work weeks due to the amazing productivity boosts technology imply, but he was under the assumption that the rewards of productivity and efficiency gains would be shared, in large part due to the much stronger labor movement of the time.

So, if we do not regulate, how do we ensure that this dismal post apocalyptic future where people like us are all dirt poor and a small number of super wealthy are the only ones to have anything doesn't occur?
 
Zarathustra[H];1041891289 said:
Looks like it might be time to move back to Sweden...

The work culture here in the US is untenable.
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can i go with you?
 
jpm100 said:
Make work. Getting 10 hours less out of a 40hr/wk employee means you have to employ 33% more people to get the same work done. Of course the cost of wages and benefits go up 33% which pump up the product price which will get a reaction of less product sold meaning more unemployment. Adding to the viscous cycle of more non-solution solutions.

But like someone already said. Can't fix stupid.
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I would be willing to bet that you are either the "average guy" that needs a full days work to accomplish what most good employees can get done in half a day or you are a micro-manager and spend more time trying to fix "how" you and others do work then actually doing work... Either way your statement makes you sound extremely inefficient at your job..

If people can do the same workload in almost half the time why can't they have the rest of the time to themselves? Same amount of work gets done and everyone is happier. I've often been in the position where I work myself out of work so I go bang out other peoples jobs and soon enough it's Friday morning and we are all staring at each other and making up work to do...
 
Koncrete said:
I would be willing to bet that you are either the "average guy" that needs a full days work to accomplish what most good employees can get done in half a day or you are a micro-manager and spend more time trying to fix "how" you and others do work then actually doing work... Either way your statement makes you sound extremely inefficient at your job..

If people can do the same workload in almost half the time why can't they have the rest of the time to themselves? Same amount of work gets done and everyone is happier. I've often been in the position where I work myself out of work so I go bang out other peoples jobs and soon enough it's Friday morning and we are all staring at each other and making up work to do...
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Except there's a limit to what you can do.

At my last job, my supervisor was hired at the same time I was and about the same age. Within 3 years he had the job duties of 4.5 formerly full time job titles that got axed. He was doing scheduling my area, he was supervising my area, he was doing departmental inventory, departmental equipment rental, and a few other things as well.

As a 30-something he went from being fit and healthy to in the 3 years going grey/bald and packing on 100+ lbs. BTW he was hired on as a 40-hour a week salary, IRL he's in the office 80hrs a week and things still don't get done because productivity has a limit and there's only one person doing 4 full-time job-titles.

We live in a time where productivity has skyrocketed thanks to automation and computers as have company profits...and in the USA wages have been stagnant or worse and worker satisfaction-well most employees hate their employers and are constantly looking for a better offer elsewhere because you can stay with the same employer for 40 years and scarce get more than a pat on the back.
 
Zarathustra[H];1041891535 said:
As more and more jobs are automated and able to be performed by machines, if we keep this mantra that shareholders invest in technology to boost productivity, and keep all the rewards of that productivity boost, it will eventually result in a massive underclass unable to find work, and a minuscule super-class holding all the wealth.
Click to expand...
Don't forget anti-aging technology that might allow people to live for hundreds of years while staying young. So on top of the automation you also have more qualified people looking for work.
So, if we do not regulate, how do we ensure that this dismal post apocalyptic future where people like us are all dirt poor and a small number of super wealthy are the only ones to have anything doesn't occur?
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You can't prevent it from happening. Eventually we'll have a class war where it's the rich vs everyone else who will fight for equality. A 6 hour work week will devalue money and eventually money will have no value. Nothing will stop this from happening.
 
I used to have a job where I worked a 3 day week and had 4 off. It was 11 hours per day but they paid us for 37 hours anyway, which was how many hours the 5 day per week people worked. It was great but had to work fri, sat, sun so no weekend socializing.
 
Ashbringer said:
A 6 hour work week will devalue money and eventually money will have no value. Nothing will stop this from happening.
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A 6 hour work week sounds lovely :p

So, France enacted the 35 hour work week 15 years ago now, and their economy has yet to collapse.

Maybe - just maybe - pushing that number to 30 can work too?

Remember, the theory here is that during long workdays, people are less productive. Studies have show that the longer hours we work, the more breaks we need to stay focused, and not drift off, or bee too tempted by social media :p

The theory is that you can reduce the workday by two hours in length and still get the same amount of work done, with the same amount of people.
 
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