27 ms·

Why are Adults so busy?

• edu 10y ago
  OMG, that was a dreadful reading. And definitely, as an adult my life feels quite more easy and manageable than what she says, and I work, clean, cook, watch netflix, practice sport, and meet my friends besides all the other adult obligations.
  • ido 10y ago
    How much time do you spend taking care of kids? That's the real time sink of adulthood (not just childcare itself, but also all the extra strain it generates in terms of household work, cleaning, etc). 10 years ago I had all the time in the world, even though I was an adult - a single, childless adult.
    • majewsky 10y ago
      Having children is a choice. Most things in the original list are not a choice.
      • emodendroket 10y ago
        Yeah, if you "choose" to be a hermit living in the woods I suppose you can cross off the 40 hours a week for work too.
        • FilterSweep 10y ago
          A hermit living in the woods still must nourish him/herself, and find/build shelter.
      • johnward 10y ago
        Technically everything on the list is a choice. You don't necessarily have to bathe.
• renox 10y ago
  I wasn't really busy until I had children..
• the-dude 10y ago
  I have scaled back years ago: ditched the car ( does away with a whole class of problems/bills ). When I had a job no more than 32hrs. No TV, no cable. Do my groceries in combination with going the postal office, while biking/walking. I rent, do not own. Try to own as little as possible. I call it the 'small life'. Lots of people in town know me, I know them, build a pretty social life. I am not going back.
  • ianai 10y ago
    I'd love that life style but I have to work.
    • ghaff 10y ago
      If I weren't working, I'm sure I would drive far more as I'd be regularly traveling places--probably including places where I would fly today.
    • allendoerfer 10y ago
      You would love less, but you have to work, because you have more?
  • justinlardinois 10y ago
    You're very lucky that you - Found a job and dwelling that are reasonably near each other and the other amenities you need in your life, all in an area that's easily navigable by bicycle and foot - Found a job that allows you to work only 32 hours while still paying enough to pay the bills
    • the-dude 10y ago
      I agree there is luck involved. But it is choices too: I chose to move back to my medium size European city ( < 200k ). The other choices have radically lowered or removed the bills I am getting. I hardly get any mail anymore.
  • dominotw 10y ago
    > No TV, no cable. > Lots of people in town know me, I know them, build a pretty social life. I love TV( youtube, Netflix, amazon etc). I grew up with state TV and there is no stopping me now. There are all kinds of amazing stuff on TV, there is no limit to how much you can explore the world. Eg: This week, I time traveled back to soviet union in the 50's got to look their communal houses, social classes, dress codes, social norms ect all while being entertained [1]. I would rather be emotionally dependent on TV than a bunch of unpredictable random strangers. 'Small life' to me not less stuff ( stuff is cheap), its having predictable emotional dependencies. I don't understand the minimalism movement, people are somehow emotionally tied to their couch so getting rid of it makes them free? >ditched the car ( does away with a whole class of problems/bills ). I never got into an actual car till I was 19 yrs old. Now I own a cheap new car that bought for around 20k from my savings. Only bill I pay is insurance of ~$100, and there is routine maintenance once every couple of months. I don't consider that 'whole class of problems'. I love owning a car, so much freedom and less dependence on random unpredictable human beings. Small life. 1. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GU8CN0K/ref=dv_web_wtls_list_pr_4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GU8CN0K/ref=dv_web_wtls_list_pr...
• sgentle 10y ago
  Interesting to contrast this with articles that paint the various delivery/cooking/cleaning/task runner services as a kind of mom-in-a-box that real adults shouldn't need. Maybe being a real adult is an unwise investment of time if you can afford to do without it.
  • ghaff 10y ago
    There's a reasonable middle ground (that will differ by person). I spend very little time on bills--direct payment in most cases. I have a housecleaner who comes every few weeks to keep things at least vaguely under control. I have a lawn service. I use Amazon Prime which eliminates lots of little errands. That said, I don't go crazy with all the Internet task services, most of which seem like more trouble than they're worth and most aren't even available where I live.
• tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  If you look deeply it's surprising how much of that list is self inflicted.
  • worldsayshi 10y ago
    How? What can you realistically avoid? (edit: or rather, what do you mean?)
    • desultir 10y ago
      kids :)
    • kragen 10y ago
      I commented on this at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12503198 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12503198.
• zerr 10y ago
  > you're working a 40 hour a week job but the rest should What rest?
  • thecatspaw 10y ago
    128 non-working hours
    • zerr 10y ago
      It doesn't quite work that way.
• ederlf 10y ago
  And it should be related to the feeling time passes so quick when you are an adult.
• DropbearRob 10y ago
  I save a solid 10.5 hours a week.. that grooming nonsense is for public facing human resources and not a cave dwelling engineer like me.. just put me in front of a computer in a dark room or in the lab with a bunch of hardware leave that grooming shit to the sales force.
• teekert 10y ago
  When I look at my 4 yr old son, what really strikes me is the way he lives in the moment. He does not care about the future one single bit. He does what he wants to do (or has to do) and that is his entire world at that moment. No worries, no planning, no "I have to save some energy because I still have to do X in 2 hours and then Y, and when am I finally going to finish Z?" He just goes until he drops. When he comes home from a camping trip, which seemed quite intensive, activity packed, he runs into the garden and starts to jump on the trampoline. The he cries because he doesn't want to go to bed but is asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow... Until he jumps out again to play with his cars. There is only now. I feel the answer is in there. Live more in the now and experience the calmness, even though you may be just as busy as ever. Busyness is just a label you put on your activities yourself. I'm sure my son does not understand being busy and if he would he would label it as a positive feeling. Busyness is a feeling caused by thinking of all the things you still have to do. Some people feel it when they have to do shopping and cook on 1 day, some people seem to never feel it even though they shop, cook, visit friends, work and do sports on 1 day. It's very subjective and there are techniques (mindfulness?) to feel it less than you do now.
  • joncrocks 10y ago
    To be fair, it's a lot easier to live in the moment when the planning is someone else's responsibility, i.e. Your son can live in the moment because you're the one buying the food, paying the bills :-)
    • teekert 10y ago
      That is of course true, but do you have to think about the shopping now, when you know you will do it at 20:00?
      • allengeorge 10y ago
        Well, to do it at 20:00 may involve a chain-reaction of related decisions that affect your behavior "now". - When should I leave to get there by 20:00? - Can I do something else along the way? - What can I get done before then? etc. etc.
• jdimov10 10y ago
  The article doesn't really answer the question. It says adults are busy because they have too much stuff to do (duh..) But "why" is still a good question, and it remains unanswered. The answer is that, as we grow up, we tend to develop the belief that our well-being needs to be justified somehow. In other words, we start to believe that we are not by default worthy of living a good, joyful, care-free, abundant life.. unless it is "deserved". And the way to justify, or "earn" our well-being, we are told, is by action. By doing things. So we become obsessed with doing things, as a way of seeking approval and justifying our well-being. Of course, as any child knows... this is ridiculous. Action is not a means to an end. Action itself is one of the ways to enjoy life.
  • sras-me 10y ago
    My thoughts exactly. The question is a very good one. But the article does not really answer it. To add to your observation, I think there is also a social aspect to it. I have often felt that being "not busy" is not socially acceptable. Or in other words being busy is somehow more respectable. So we tend to brag about being busy, and helps to perpetuate this point of view.
    • brain5ide 10y ago
      "If you're not busy, why don't you help me doing this thing that we both kinda like? (but I have to do for reasons other than pure enjoyment)" I think that social acceptance sums up into that sentence here.
  • ianai 10y ago
    I see it more as people wanting to experience everything they can. Plus, modern life adds on many demands.
    • pharke 10y ago
      > I see it more as people wanting to experience everything they can. I call this the buffet approach to life. Some people seem to want to cram a tiny bit of every thing onto their plate, nibbling at everything there is to offer. The alternative being a full course dinner with superbly executed dishes that compliment each other. Or you could just eat steak, whatever you prefer.
• kbart 10y ago
  Most of tasks are exaggerated or poorly managed. I do all the mentioned stuff, get a good night sleep (7-8 h), plus studying for master's degree and still have time for my hobbies and friends. Time management is a critical skill to learn while being adult.
• jbb555 10y ago
  A lot of my time is 'wasted' by recovering from work. I have a nice physically easy programming job. But it's quite a lot of hours, and there is travel on top of that. But when I get home I need to spend at least an hour basically going 'ughhhhh' and just doing nothing much. It's necessary, but eats so much time.
  • bryanlarsen 10y ago
    What's your commute like? Can you arrange things to combine commute and de-stress time? In my experience the best way to de stress is to walk, but that's obviously not feasible for most. It's worth moving to make it possible, in my opinion. Mass transit is pretty awesome too. Even if it takes longer, you can plug in your headphones and zone, netflix and chill, or best of all, take a nap. Biking in urban areas can be pretty stressful, but the exercise it provides is pretty effective at helping the body recover from stress.
    • Jaruzel 10y ago
      I'm not sure 'netflix and chill ' is allowed on mass transit to be honest...
      • bryanlarsen 10y ago
        I didn't realize that was a euphemism. I guess I'm getting old. It seems obvious in retrospect. Mass transit would be much more appealing if you could, though!
        • beachstartup 10y ago
          it is, and it isn't. depends on context. i don't think op meant it, but the replier made a joke of it, which turned it sexual.
      • gaius 10y ago
        You've never gotten the last train out of King's Cross on a Friday night then...
• Walf 10y ago
  Missed security. You could argue it falls under the responsibility sections, but protecting your possessions without your presence is definitely extra effort.
  • justinlardinois 10y ago
    Perhaps. Some people are lucky enough that closing the windows and locking the doors are enough.
  • meric 10y ago
    Easy, have less stuff. Save time shopping, save time on security, save time on disposal.
  • miahi 10y ago
    How do you do that?
• amelius 10y ago
  I'm wondering why, with all the technological progress, we don't have 8 hour work-weeks just yet :)
  • bnegreve 10y ago
    Yes, good question. I think this is because nowadays, work is mostly a way to skew wealth distribution in your favor. Therefore people that can work more, do work more. That contributes to make them wealthier. The others, are unemployed.
    • FilterSweep 10y ago
      I believe your last two sentences hit the full truth. The real answer, individual consultants, and self-run people aside, is that if you DONT work more (to employers standard), you become unemployed.
  • branchless 10y ago
    You will never have it. As productivity increases you will have more disposable income and land prices will rise pushing up rents. See Henry George "On progress and poverty". The more advanced the more poor. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progress_and_Poverty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progress_and_Poverty The current system transfers gains over to land. Silicon valley being a prime example, all on their big salaries with big rents. Zuckerberg and a bunch of land owners got rich, the latter without raising a finger.
  • reustle 10y ago
    If you're actually serious about cutting down your work week, check out the book 4 Hour Work Week. It's not perfect, but at least does a good job at entertaining the idea.
  • crpatino 10y ago
    Because of the asymmetry in laboral relationships. If you have a rare, valuable skill, employers will be willing to pay handsomely for your time, but they will demand a lot of your time. IF you are good enough, they will be even willing to pay you premium to have you not use your skills for anyone else. The caveat is that these arrangements are, more often than not, non-negotiable. It is an all or nothing proposition. On the other hand, if your skills are commodity, potential employers will be happy to hire you part time (so they do not have to give you any benefits). However, your wage will be so low that, more often than not, you'll want to juggle two or more part-time jobs so you can earn a reasonable compensation that actually pays for your living expenses.
• sagischwarz 10y ago
  The numbers seemed very high to me so I created a list on my own and thought I'd share it (single, no kids, full time job). 1. Work: 40 hours 2. Cooking: 3 h (who the hell cooks three times a day?) 3. Laundry: 0.5 h (once a week) 4. Cleaning: 1 h (and I am very clean, I just avoid producing dirt) 5. Buying stuff: .5 h (I try to avoid buying too much stuff I don't really need) 6. Bills: 0 h (they a are paid automatically from my account) 7. Small errands: 1 h 8. Transport: 4 h (I ride my bicycle to work, so one could count that as exercise) 9. Staying healthy: 4 h (in addition to the bicycling to and from work) 10. Finances: 0 h (I have no idea how anyone can spend so much time on this. I just live by the simple rule: don't get into debt and move some of your income automatically on a saving account) 11. Taxes: 0 h (automated in Germany) 12. Responsibility for Yourself: 0 h (weird point) 13. Responsibility for your dependents: 0 h (I'm not responsible for anyone and visiting my family is fun) 14. Being sick: 0 h 15. One time errands: 2 h (I have to do some irregular stuff) 16. Long term planning: 1h (because I'm actively thinking about it at the moment) 1. Attire and Grooming: 3.5 h (half an hour every morning, 3 minutes in the evening) 2. Sleep: 49 h 3. Eating: 1.5 h (breakfast and lunch is included in work time) Overall: 109 h Free time: 49 h I think it all comes down to priorities and you current life situation. But one can influence most of these things and you have to decide what is really important in your life. For me, it's free time.
  • cdubzzz 10y ago
    You say free time is your priority, but even with this ideal list (it makes some very unrealistic assumptions) your free time is only 50% of your responsibilities time.
    • sagischwarz 10y ago
      Yes, it could be more. I'm actually thinking about reducing my working hours. Could you elaborate on which assumptions seem unrealistic to you? I tried to list them as honest as possible, but for sure I might have overlooked something. The estimated free time aligns quite well with my daily perception (also, I could see 'staying healthy' as free time, because I go rock climbing and thats just something I love to do as a hobby).
• return0 10y ago
  Free time is a dangerous thing, so urban adults must be kept entertained during their free time.
• enibundo 10y ago
  Well if you cook for more people, and someone cleans for more people and someone else does something for more people... it becomes fun and you won't have to do some stuff of that list because someone else did it.
• xg15 10y ago
  Because we have to do all the stuff now that our parents used to do for us?
• atemerev 10y ago
  Being rich and never having to work except on something you really want to do is worth achieving mostly because of this. I don't really care about material things, and I love my job, but being free to do anything I want is liberating.
  • z3t4 10y ago
    This also leads to breakthroughs like tools, agriculture, figuring out the planet is round, math, philosophy, physics etc. Most people would just party though.
• ericdykstra 10y ago
  "I'm busy" is really just an excuse for not taking productive action. You know all those people you look up to that seem to be 10 times more productive than you? Whether it's Elon Musk running multiple blue ocean companies while being a technological innovator or Richard Branson leading over 400 companies, or whoever it might be, they all have the same 24 hours that you do. In the end it's up to you whether you find ways to make the most out of your time or just repeat the same tasks every day. It took me a long time to realize this, but it finally clicked for me fairly recently. Record everything you do for a day, figure out which are of low or no value, and figure out how to get rid of them, create systems to reduce the time you spend on them, or delegate them. The most time-consuming things often can't be totally cut out, but they can be systemized or delegated. In the end, only you control your time (and if you don't, you have a bigger problem). Edit: If anyone is interested in the resources I've found helpful in this realization and the implementation of taking actions to take back control of my own time, feel free to send me an email (in profile).
  • carrier_lost 10y ago
    "The most time-consuming things often can't be totally cut out, but they can be systemized or delegated." This is a big part of it, and it makes the comparison between Musk or Branson and an average Joe a bit disingenuous. They have the wealth afford to delegate many things that consume an average person's time. I doubt Musk does his own grocery shopping, and Branson likely doesn't scrub his own toilets.
    • ericdykstra 10y ago
      It's hard to come up with examples without choosing people with wealth, since people who excel at time management become wealthy. It starts with good time management techniques, which leads to wealth, which leads to the ability to delegate the low and no-value parts of your life. Let's say someone with bad time management goes to the grocery store every day, and the nearest one is a 10 minute drive away. They spend at minimum 45 minutes going to and from the grocery store, choosing food, waiting in checkout lines etc every day. That's over 5 hours per week! Musk spends 0 hours. But it's not all or nothing. Instead, a 30 minute investment of planning out a general meal schedule and grocery list for it on Sunday, and one trip to the grocery store might take an hour and a half. That's 3.5 hours of savings per week! Repeat this for cooking, cleaning around the house, etc, and I guarantee you can find significant time savings in systemizing routines. If you save even 2 hours every week, that's an entire 8 hour work day per month. If you make, let's say, $300 daily as a software engineer that's quite a bit of savings! Even... maybe enough to hire a house cleaner and someone to do grocery shopping for you.
• brohoolio 10y ago
  Family. Let me give you one example. Birthdays. My wife has two sisters and both parents are alive. That's 5 events a year. Double that for my family. 10 events a year. That's basically once a month I'm spending a weekend afternoon or evening. That's just birthdays. Add kids in and suddenly every other weekend is filled with something. That isn't including extended family.
• knorker 10y ago
  Much of this doesn't apply to me, but mostly because I've been implicitly trying to avoid it. I don't do my taxes because I can buy an accountants time, but I can't buy more "time". It's another reason I don't want a huge collection of "stuff". "Stuff" takes your time. I don't have a car for this reason, and I live in a city that doesn't require one. But the article is motivating me to be more explicit about the things that take time. To make sure I spend that time doing what I want. Also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3JzcCviNDk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3JzcCviNDk
  • douche 10y ago
    This is my single biggest justification for not doing my own laundry. I've run experiments. If I take my laundry to a laundromat, run it through the washer, move it to the drier, (run it through the drier again because it isn't dry), fold and put it all away, it costs me about $12 in quarters. It also costs me two or three hours of time, where I'm pretty much stuck at the laundromat, unable to do anything really worthwhile. If I drop the laundry off at the laundromat and have them do it for me, that wash-dry-fold service usually costs about $30. I toss it in a bag, stop at the laundromat on the way to work, then on the way home that night I stop in again and pick up bags of fresh, nicely folded laundry, with all my shirts on hangers. It's so much easier, and trading a little bit of money for time not spent doing something tedious is a big win.
    • Paul_S 10y ago
      I don't understand it. We've had washing machines for decades in this country. Surely USA can afford them as well. You can get a used one for nothing. Literally.
    • knorker 10y ago
      I rent, but when I moved in I still paid to replace the washer with a washer-dryer. I spend less than 5 minutes a month on washing clothes. (I have multiple laundry baskets so they're pre-sorted) If something needs ironing I either don't buy it in the first place, or I have it dry cleaned just to get in ironed.
  • deleted 10y ago
• losteverything 10y ago
  You stop working you start dying.
  • FilterSweep 10y ago
    Working for another person, or working for yourself? It's possible to be unemployed, and working.
    • losteverything 10y ago
      I'm fortunate enough to have access to people who stopped working. All do not need to work for income. Often, after working years, they perish quickly. Others spend their days in front of tv. This saddens me. Imagine telling the young intern that after you sell your practice you spend your days watching tv. Day in day out. Or the widow who is always on her couch. Or the well off retired exec trying to figure out how to spend years and years of days ahead of him. Being rich and old and not working is a bad formula.
• TeMPOraL 10y ago
  I never realized how much free time I had until I started blowing my responsibilities off and watching TV series or playing video games. The point is, a lot of the things we do in our adult lives are bullshit errands that exist only because of habit, custom or societal expectations. I'm in progress of trying to get rid of as much of them as possible (and automate others), to reclaim some free time for actually productive endeavours.
  • matwood 10y ago
    This is a good point. For example, I hate going to the grocery store. Buying good food to cook for a night is fun, but the general grocery shopping is a horrible experience. A combination of Amazon Subscribe and Save, Pantry, and services like Blue Apron mean I rarely go to the store. And things like subscribe and save mean I never have to think about when I'm out of toilet paper, it just shows up on a schedule which I have figured out now.
    • bryanlarsen 10y ago
      It seems counter-intuitive, but I massively cut down on my grocery store time by going every day. Pop in after work every day, grab 3-5 items, hit the self-checkout and out. Takes about 5 minutes. If I forget something, no big deal, I'll be there tomorrow. Whereas before you'd spend time thinking about the rest of the week to make a list, dash around the kitchen to check the essentials, drive to the store, spend > 30 minutes in the store getting everything, drive back, ... Probably 1.5-2 hours total.
    • VLM 10y ago
      I peapodded for a couple years when my kids were very small and ultra-high labor, but I found the ability to micromanage my delivery made me spend about as much time on their website as I used to spend shopping (omg hold on while I google ten pages about how many oz of fresh blueberries I need to buy to make exactly 1/2 crushed cup whereas at the store I'd rely on my finely honed nearly instant engineering estimation ability). So if my daughter needs a box of raisins for snack time at school and there's 6 days until delivery and 2 are a weekend and there's 8 on the shelf and the next delivery is the 22nd then I need to buy how many packs of raisins? Whereas in the store I'd just buy one week sized pack per week until there's a backlog and then skip a week which is a much simpler algorithm. Also I like hiking but lets get real sometimes the weather sux or its dark out or the air is clouded with bugs... and the supermarket is well lit, flat, hvac, bug free, sometimes I just need to put a couple thousand steps on the ole step counter... I am also an amazon S+S user like yourself and a HUGE gripe I have is UPC churn. So I subscribe to three gigantic mouthwash bottles delivered every six months and like clockwork each time that rolls around the UPC has been cancelled/discontinued and I need to shop a fresh for something inflation adjusted to be 1.5 oz smaller for their profit or whatever. I would like to S+S to a more generic product/service like ship me qty three of two month sized (enormous) mouthwash bottles twice a year of minty fluoride freshness and I don't care the exact brand or the exact size to the mL.
• GoToRO 10y ago
  It's easy. We are busy because we stay at work too much. Also todays jobs are not so fulfilling, which means you need more time to recover. Make the work day 4 hours + meal and things will be better.
• blowski 10y ago
  There was a very good radio programme on BBC Radio 4 about busyness: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07v07pb http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07v07pb In a nutshell, we're busy because people value things based on the perceived effort that goes into them. This is why people are frustrated if it takes you 1 minute to update their website but still want £100. So if you appear to be very busy, you appear to be putting more effort into your work. The same applies to parenting - we think busy parents are perceived as better parents. At least, that's the argument made in the programme.
• wccrawford 10y ago
  I've got a different answer. People are "busy" because they fill every waking hour with something to do. If they ever find themselves without something to do, they make something up or change something so it provides some perceived benefit and takes more time. For example, I dated a girl who said she had no free time, despite only working 1 job part time and basically never going out. I eventually found out it was because she'd do things like walk go to the grocery store for fresh food every single day. And then complain that she didn't have enough time to spend with her son. I'm not blaming her. It's her choice, and there's nothing wrong with it. But that incident made me look at my own life and I realized that any time I could possibly be bored, I'd find something do to. For me, it was usually something fun in the name of de-stressing. If I ever managed to get bored with everything I had, I'd pick up a new hobby. I now have far, far too many hobbies to actually do much of any one of them, and I switch between them as I get bored. As I look around, I see others doing this as well. The idea of simply sitting and getting bored is basically impossible. At the worst, there's always cable TV or Netflix or something, and shows you just have to watch. It's quite fascinating once you can look in on it from the outside.
  • namaemuta 10y ago
    Then the real answer is "People are "busy" because they don't want to be bored".
  • TeMPOraL 10y ago
    I think there are different types of people. Personally, I always have more things I'd like to do - much more interesting than job, errands, family time, etc. - than time for them. So I wouldn't e.g. go for fresh food to a store every day (other than as a part of the commute, or during lunch break at work), because I need the time for something else (like doing a home automation project, or playing a video game). So I guess some people may be "busy" by inventing activities to avoid boredom (I'm pretty sure I know a lot of people like that), but others would love to have more free time to spend it on even more things they're already interested in.
    • wccrawford 10y ago
• jezclaremurugan 10y ago
  I guess most of the comments focussing on cutting down work.. but I get a serious mid life crisis - "what am I doing with my life" sinking feeling when I have time to spare. Being busy helps me avoid that..
  • anotheryou 10y ago
    I find it hard to compete against you in the job market, haha. I have a gazillion things I'd want to do if I had the time and energy.
• kriro 10y ago
  "Take us through a typical work day for you/your cofounder". "Well for four to six hours we do X,Y,Z very focused and intensely and then we rest and think subconsciously/do nothing". "Wait you mean you're only doing this halftime?" "No we chose to do it this way because there's some decent research that suggests this is both the most efficient way of doing it and the most healthy way of doing it. It's a full time job." "Ok, thanks."
• sqren 10y ago
  Maybe this should be worded: Why are American adults so busy. I've been living in the US for a couple of years, and have thoroughly enjoyed it, but it occurs to me that life is more "rushed" than I'm used to from Denmark. RE: 1) Have Money The standard work week is 37 hours. I love my job, but this leaves me plenty of time to do other stuff I enjoy. RE: 6) Bills, Bills, Bills Living in the US for a couple of years taught me this: cheques are a real thing and most payment processes are manual. Denmark: I no longer receive bills. The banking infrastructure allow consumers to "subscribe" to businesses, who can then withdraw the correct amount. If the amount increases the consumer won't have to change a thing. And it is easy to unsubscribe again :) RE: 8) Transport + 9) Staying Healthy Get a bike and combine commuting with exercise ;) RE: 11) Taxes Paying taxes in the US is A PAIN. Ordinary people need to hire an accountant (and still do most of the grunt work themselves) to make sure they pay the right amount. Denmark: fully automated system. Yes, the government has access to my bank account and investments (!privacy!), but my only tax-related action is to click "Accept" once a year.
  • lagadu 10y ago
    It's the impression I got as well: it seems to be an exclusively american list. All bills are set up to be paid automatically and the whole "financial planning" thing that there's effectively no need to do here.
  • maxsilver 10y ago
    >RE6: The banking infrastructure allow consumers to "subscribe" to businesses We have this in the US (almost all businesses have an 'Automatic Bill Pay' or similar) But businesses are very routinely "slightly-corrupt" here, so many don't trust it. Businesses will purposefully withdraw more than they should, and make you fight to get it back. Or will raise prices without telling you. Or will continue to bill you after you unsubscribe (if they let you unsubscribe at all). Often you have to yell or make threats to people on telephones, or publicly harass a company on Twitter / Facebook, or manually withhold payment, to get any kind of appropriate response. This creates an atmosphere where people don't trust businesses with "subscriptions" or automation of any kind of bills. Which further perpetuates the antique cheque-based bill payment process. It's not a technology problem (we have the technology). It's more of a "poisoned trust" issue. > RE: 11) my only tax-related action is to click "Accept" once a year. We have this in the US -- the IRS is already capable of offering this. It's just illegal for them to do so, because of Intuit's political influence. (Again with the businesses being corrupt...) http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/16/technology/personaltech/turbotax-or-irs-as-tax-preparer-intuit-has-a-favorite.html http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/16/technology/personaltech/tu...
• chillingeffect 10y ago
  An additional perspective: most of us don't leave and rejoin our jobs, so we have no downtime, long fluid moments of activity and rest. Also we forego most healthy time now for a massive payoff at retirement with diminished health. We fear this constantly. To fix it, we should become contractors or 4 day week workers.
  • johnward 10y ago
    I have some contractor friends and they say that they feel so much more respect. When there is overtime involved the client usually pushed it to their salaried staff because there is no cost to them. I went on vacation for a week and couldn't go a day without someone contacted me about some BS at work. There is no mental break at all anymore. I'm a enterprise consultant so any over time I work is basically free money for my employer.
• lucaspiller 10y ago
  I'm going to go against the norm: I recently bought my first car (I'm nearly 30) and am amazed how much time it saves and freedom it gives me. I've always lived in European cities with good public transport, but even here having a car is worthwhile. Instead of taking a train and bus 30+ minutes to work, I leave when I want and know it will take me around 15 minutes to get there. Maybe I'm weird, but I find driving a lot more relaxing than public transport (at the moment it's really hot here so AC helps). If I want to get groceries I can stop in a supermarket on my way home from work, instead of walking 15 minutes each way (bonus: it also has a bigger selection and cheaper prices). If I want to get out of the city it's easy, I can drive for 20 minutes instead of taking trains and buses for 1 1/2 hours and I'm at the sea. Before if I wanted to do that I'd book a car from a rental place, go collect it, return it hoping I didn't get any scratches, where as now I can be spontaneous. Having a car can be expensive (I estimate over the life of my car it'll cost me around €2000/year + fuel) but for the benefits it provides, to me that is a justifiable cost.
  • microcolonel 10y ago
    A lot of people think too rigidly to accept that some people could really benefit from owning a car. For me it's a much tougher decision because the costs are much higher due to mandatory both-ways insurance being required. I basically can't afford to have both savings and a car where I live. Damn shame though, because I would benefit immensely from having a light truck (something the size of a Hilux). If I want to bring handguns to a range, the law basically requires that I own an automobile. If I want to get construction materials or inexpensive/exotic Korean groceries, I need an automobile. Your estimate for the cost of owning your vehicle is actually considerably lower than just having a public transit pass for that same year where I live.
  • dasboth 10y ago
    > I find driving a lot more relaxing than public transport +1 from me. Public transport in London is a nightmare during rush hour, I'd happily trade that for an equivalent drive. Probably wouldn't be (much?) more expensive either.
    • 10y ago
• Tepix 10y ago
  So, most of the things on these list are avoidable. Some are not. Doing the laundry is a good example. With a 4 person household, this takes up a lot of time! A robot to take this chore away from me would be extremely valuable. I can't wait for technology to advance so these become available.
• jefe_ 10y ago
  Wash & Fold Laundromat changed my life. Am able to eliminate a massive chore for $17-22 per week. Every Tuesday on my way to work, I drop off my clothes and on the way back, I pick up my clothes, hung and folded as if they were brand new. I was never able to achieve the level of consistency with a laundry schedule when I did it myself.
• Damogran6 10y ago
  Compounded with the current (IT) expectation that you should do and be everything for your job. It should be the first thing you look at when the alarm goes off, and the last thing you look at when you go to bed, and at 2pm on Saturday...work work work. But then you're made redundant in the name of 'finding inefficiencies' due to the merger and find yourself with...nothing outside the office that defines you.
• qznc 10y ago
  They are not really busy, but it is one of the best socially-accepted excuses.
  • emodendroket 10y ago
    Even aside from social stuff I don't really finish everything I hope to every week. I don't know about everyone else.
  • FilterSweep 10y ago
    I hear this jib all of the time. One thing the author missed in his, otherwise spot-on calculations, is the fact that after spending a certain amount of time on one task - namely work for most people, marginal hours of "free time" afterwards are actually not "free time" - they're hours spent in mental recovery. This varies for each person, but you see a recurring theme of people sitting on their couch or in front of their computer just staring at a screen. But their mindless staring is only telling half the story. Could they possibly just go to sleep? Sure, but waking up at 4AM has even worse implications on the next work day. These people are recovering by doing nothing. This is why so many of my friends who saved up a nest egg as developers have recently quit their jobs upon hitting quarter-life crisis. All of a sudden, they now have the free time to do other development work they enjoy (often more productively), pursue other hobbies, cook, build/create art, fill up their day with MORE than just the monolith of the work day, and come out feeling "less busy" despite having achieved more than when they were employed. The work week really is a monolith. Spending over 1/3 of your entire day on this monolith has implications on the other 2/3 of your day.
• dboreham 10y ago
  Obviously they are busy because they are reading and responding to Hacker News.
• ams6110 10y ago
  Dependents typically take a lot more than 2 hrs/week. More like 2hrs/day if they are in school and involved in any extra-curricular activities, at least until they are of driving age. On days where they might have e.g. a game, or some other performance or event, this can easily double.
• hooph00p 10y ago
  >A half-hour a day -- that's five hours a week. A lot of this stuff is kind of... exaggerated. There's no real metrics except for these "small piece of day" x "five days a week" to make it seem dramatic. Not much value in this post.
• dharma1 10y ago
  Looking at our nearest relatives, primates, they seem to have a pretty chill life. Also, I think there is a vast difference between spending time on something that is intrinsically rewarding, and on something that isn't.
• thebigspacefuck 10y ago
  I keep catching myself thinking or using the excuse I have no time, but I mostly spend my time on the internet or watching TV. Some nights I do the dishes or actually go for a walk, go grocery shopping, but mostly I'm just hanging on, making sure I'm ready for he next day. I'm freaking addicted to information and the internet, which leave me feeling frantic. I forgo sleeping for the internet and it brings me little pleasure. I wish I could stop, but like this morning I was sitting on the couch with nothing to do and I had to go get my phone which I've probably wasted 20 minutes on. It doesn't seem like much time but I could have gone to get toilet paper from the store which I sort of could use right now. I'd like to hear this lost from someone older, who was in the 80s or 90s and hear their perspective. I know my parents at least are hooked into the internet entertainment machine like I am and they didn't use to be. Was there more time? Was it better?
  • emodendroket 10y ago
    I'm guessing that many people who are now alive would have just sat in front of the TV instead if there were no Internet.
    • Retric 10y ago
      The internet on your phone is kind of uniquely addictive. You can basically replace any downtime with playing on your phone. The sad thing is it can jump into the middle of any activity. Getting lunch, wait one second text message which you need to respond to right now.
      • pc86 10y ago
        I think it's rarely that you actually need to respond to any text message immediately.
        • Retric 10y ago
          In theory you're right. However, the expectation is someone will respond with ~"Thx, in meeting" unlike a phone where you may just let it go to voicemail, there is no message failed to get though feedback. So, you get sent a text and people will generally assume you are ignoring them unless you respond.
• truebosko 10y ago
  I'm busy because I work 60 hours a week so I can ensure my family has what they need as we grow. My mentality, and I hope I don't break away from this (and continue down a spiral of working too much) is to gradually reduce my workload as my son gets older. Right now he's a tiny baby who I can support by ensuring I help with feedings and care so my partner can be happy as well. That's easy, and I can focus on boosting my career in the mean time. It helps he goes to bed at 7pm, so I am able to catch up on work after hours. It's not ideal, but it's the reality right now. To achieve what we want as a family. Once he's older, I want to be able to spend actual daddy time and interact with him in a meaningful way. That's the goal, at least.
  • vitro 10y ago
    Kids form their base behaviour and approach to the world until three years old, this is the most important time.
    • truebosko 10y ago
      For sure. I'm not neglecting my child at all, at least like to think I am not :) When he is awake in the mornings and evenings, we spend ample time. Of course, weekends are a great time together as well. Didn't mean to make my comment sound like I am neglecting my child, but I could see how it could be perceived that way!
• raheemm 10y ago
  This chart from the bureau of labor statistics shows where our time goes. Work is the # 1 activity, followed by sleep. http://www.bls.gov/tus/charts/ http://www.bls.gov/tus/charts/
• EGreg 10y ago
  Think of it a different way. We fill up our time, subconsciusly, to avoid the existential angst. Especially if you are an atheist. Many religious people find time to pray three times a day and still be very productive. Today, corporations have happily made this situation they own your time for 8 hours a day and you are afraid to lose your steady paycheck, so in many jobs, you pretend to work those 8 hours, refuse to build anything of value for yourself or others for fear of getting fired. It is a bit of an infantile mentality that's conditioned for 40 hours a week. Sweden has just moved to a 6-hour day! In the past, people didn't have netflix or facebook. You'd see photos of people chilling outside, and in real life. More people were out. Playing sports etc. That's not on your list!
• marmot777 10y ago
  Kids.
• codingdave 10y ago
  I think we have full control over how busy we are. But we also have full knowledge of the consequences of our actions, or lack thereof. So we choose to do more. Maybe we work more to have a nicer home, which takes more work to maintain. Maybe we hire out maintenance to have less money, but more time. Maybe we choose to have children and a spouse, which takes time. Maybe we choose to have a nice yard. Maybe we choose none of those things, and sit in a low-maintenance apartment playing games, or maybe we ditch it all and hike the Appalachian Trail. The point is that we make those choices. If anyone feels they do not have that control of their life, that is a problem I would suggest be fixed.
• xyzzy4 10y ago
  Get a South Asian wife, they'll do most of your chores for you.
  • selimthegrim 10y ago
    Yeah, my dad thought that. Didn't work out so well when he was served divorce papers.
• mholmes680 10y ago
  I think one thing here was missed: managing [successful] relationships. I have 2 kids - i have to directly manage a relationship with my wife, with each kid, with both kids, and with my wife and both kids. She has to do the same. I have to indirectly manage a relationship between the two kids, and with the wife and both/each kids. To do it right would mean breaking up those 10 free hours I might have into each of the above.
  • kyriakos 10y ago
    This hit right in the centre of the target. My time got exponentially less with every additional member added to my family. Of course I do enjoy maintaining the relationships but it does have a toll on work and personal leisure.
  • zaroth 10y ago
    The OP clearly doesn't have kids for how glossed over the point is. Amazing that they come up with just 10 spare hours a week without even really factoring kids into the equation. For those of us who have kids, you just sit back some days and wonder... How little we recognized at the time, the sheer freedom of being able to just head out for dinner or a drink any day of the week, plop down and watch whatever movie we wanted, sleep in on the weekends, etc. OP does acknowledge the workload of having children is "indefinite" but doesn't really do justice to the reality of raising children. The funny thing is how that theoretical 10 hours per week of free time will somehow make way for the ~40 hours per week spent on the children. Shopping for new shirts because they don't excite you anymore? Yeah, parents ain't got time for that BS!
    • kale 10y ago
      Nothing can prepare you for the "crap I can't do anything spontaneous now" like having children. I recently had to let tickets to a concert go (that I was really looking forward to) because the babysitter had a family emergency. And this is a deep confession that I've never really told anyone: I envy my divorced friends with kids. Every other week they (usually) are child free. And get to do things like mow grass, have a dinner with an SO at a place that doesn't have a built-in playground, or go on weekend trips on a whim. That guaranteed time without children that you get from custody agreements has a ton of perks. I won't admit this out loud, though.
• Xcelerate 10y ago
  As someone who just finished grad school, I'm preparing my future for "minimum maintenance" so that way I can have lots of free time for interesting projects. Shopping, cleaning, commuting, and house maintenance are not on my list of interesting projects, so I would like to minimize the time spent doing these things. * Shopping — Don't shop, except for the necessities (and when you need them, buy in bulk). I generally feel like having stuff adds stress to my life. My girlfriend and I once had a somewhat humorous argument over whether a kitchen table is really a "need". * House maintenance — I'll probably rent apartments as long as I can get away with it, but because all of the best high schools are usually in the suburbs, I imagine I'll need a house once I have kids. It will be a small house, but well built. Poured from concrete so I don't have to worry about weather and tornados (most American houses are made from cheap wood). No wallpaper — that stuff gums up all of the time and is a pain to clean. No carpet or wood — carpet is a grime magnet and wood gets scuffed up. I'll use large tiles on my floors (or at least those ceramic tiles that look like wood). I'll have a tiny yard. If I have to mow, I don't want it to take more than five minutes. * Commuting — After the initial years of my career, I want a job that requires a commute no longer than 10-15 minutes. Living near a city center or finding a remote job are both solutions to this. My brother-in-law drives 3 hours a day for his job; I can't imagine giving away that much of my time. The key to having more time is to try to think about how every decision you make might cost time in the future. Granted, many people may not be able to make free time because of circumstances beyond their control, but I think these tips and this kind of thought process can at least help a little bit.
  • BlackFly 10y ago
    I compared my own hours to the ones in the article. I end up with 40 spare hours a week. That feels correct: I have a lot of spare time. I work 40 hours a week (arrive at 9, leave at 6, with 1 hour for cooking/eating). I am married and it seems that my wife and I evenly split the work between cooking (me) and cleaning (mostly her). We buy groceries together every second day and take about 30 minutes to do so. I spend absolutely no time managing my bills as they are automated and nobody has credit card debt in Europe. I have very few errands. I bike to work for a grand total of 1.7 hours a week which I count as fitness. I go to the gym 3 times a week for a total of about 4.5 hours. We have no children and that is a life decision. I don't spend more than an hour each day grooming/dressing, nor does my wife, what is the author doing? Yes, I sleep 8 hours a day and spend about 10.5 hours eating. Now, where does the difference come? Well if I worked 60 hours a week I would lose half of my free time, but overworking is really silly. The difference in commute alone gives me nearly an hour a day of extra time to myself compared to the author. Also, if you can enjoy cooking, that is time that is productively spent. So learn to enjoy cooking. You should be enjoying your meals too, so thinking of those hours as cost is a bit sad.
• ausjke 10y ago
  I read the list, to my surprise it mentioned nothing about raising kids, which took away 40%+ of my daily energy averagely and is the sole/main reason I feel busy, not to mention all the arguments and emotional stress etc you have to deal with daily.
• kentt 10y ago
  Since the article didn't answer the question of why, I'll submit a partial answer. People put a minimal value on their free time and so it gets sucked up with things of minimal value. One place I've noticed this in that placing a high value on my own time comes off as self-important. As well, wondering why colleagues aren't placing a high value on their time, leave me bewildered. Just the other day, a friend was showing me how he was playing around with React to create a calculator to show how much money he could save by getting gas over the border. Since we're on a US/Canada border town, we can save 5-10 dollars by filling up over the border. He's made his calculator just to help learn React. I asked him why he went to the US to get gas and he told me it was to save money. $5! It makes the 5 min job of getting gas into a 30 min chore. He's a freelancer which I think my company pays around ~100/hr. He doesn't think this is strange and no one else who was listening did.
  • shandor 10y ago
    Oh my god yes. I generally put a price tag on everything I do. Depending on ones salary it might be anything from 20 to 300 per hour. Then, if I see myself "making a loss" according to that calculation, I start paying for someone else to do the thing. Or, like in your gas example, definitely fill up on my side of the border.
    • cortesoft 10y ago
      I do the same calculation, but it isn't quite as simple as making sure you save more money than time spent * salary per hour. For one, you can't just work more hours whenever you want, in however small of chunks you want. If something takes ten minutes, it's not like you could just choose to work for your salary for those ten minutes. Second, not all work is equal, and you can't do all work for an infinite amount of time. Whether you are a physical or mental laborer, you only have so much productive energy for your job. You can't just work 18 hours a day and pay for everything else with the extra money.
      • shandor 10y ago
        I have a feeling that we're talking about a little different things. My meaning was that I rigorously try to put a price tag on my free time, just like my minutes are counted and paid for at work. This really helps me to put many priorities straight immediately. Like GP's "oh hey let's fetch gas from 39 mins away to save a penny" example, it is usually very easy for people to give zero value for their own time when making such decisions. Putting a virtual price tag for that extra 25 mins helps to prioritize those things in life that are all lumped under the category of "free time"; family, kids, friends, just relaxing at sauna, whatever.
• 6DM 10y ago
  Bills are a once a month thing, I rent so maybe it's different but my student loans should make up for that. In total? 15 minutes tops. I dry clean my clothes myself, so yeah I agree clothes _can_ take up to 2 hrs. But picking out what to wear and polishing your shoes shouldn't count as an extra 10.5 hours a week. Most people enjoy buying stuff, especially if it requires research because then they get psyched about it. Who doesn't like a new car? Other than that, it should be pretty rare to need to research for window cleaning products. You just buy what looks alright on the shelf and if it sucks don't buy it again. The rest I'll agree with. Most people I see that "waste" their time are doing things like, marathoning Game of Thrones, drinking or celebrating something. Here are some real wastes: - Going after companies to get your money back for either incorrectly or over charging you, or charging you for services not rendered. - "Market forces" raising prices, causing you to move right freaking next door so your rent can stay the same, or even lower. - How about those Dr. appointments that you scheduled, only so you can wait an extra hour to actually be seen. - Warranty covered oil changes that take an hour or even two (last time it happened to me). - Standing in a 40 minute long line at the store because despite having 30 register's, they only have 2 cashiers. There is self checkout but of course it's already full of people struggling to understand how the machine works, or they're just generally slow moving. - Holiday traffic/parking, where do all these vehicles come from? Even small towns get congested it's a real mystery to me. - Spontaneously waking up in the middle of the night for a few hours, then oversleeping the next morning. Also, you need to go to bed early now to make it up. - Paperwork for just about any government related activity. I just listed my SSN on three different pages why do I still have to fill this in again? I'm sure there are more I'm not thinking of...
  • kragen 10y ago
    What solvent do you use for the dry-cleaning? In my comment I said that dry-cleaning is too dangerous to not outsource, but I'm happy to change my opinion if I'm wrong. BTW, if you want to reformat your list so it can be read without scrolling left and right for each line, you can use a · on each item, leave a blank line between them, and not indent it. The typography sucks but not quite as bad as what you have now.
• mooreds 10y ago
  Automate all the things! If you are spending an hour a week tracking bills, or even 1/2 hour, you aren't taking advantage of your bank. We set up auto bill pay whenever we can. I prefer to have it through my bank or my credit card rather than through the service provider doing EFT, because it's easier to shut off and it centralizes the view. That doesn't mean you can totally put this task on autopilot, just that automation can make sure you don't have late fees and that you don't spend money on stamps.
  • johnward 10y ago
    I don't want autopay from my bank account. Automatically paying with a CC is ideal and then just making one payment to CC. Then you can dispute if you are billed the incorrect amount. I don't think my power bill, for example, will take credit. Plus is fluctuates from $400-$800 a month so I like to see how much it is before I pay.
• anexprogrammer 10y ago
  Well this is clearly written by someone without committments and children. Young adults used to be having children. With young kids around, the laundry and responsibility for dependents figures become hours daily, not weekly. When they're a bit older there's less cleaning but now you're running them around more and ensuring they meet their commitments. With more gadgets, chemicals and domestic appliances we've just invented higher standards and hundreds of new things to do. The to do list is 20x longer, but each task takes less time. Whilst we might not want to return to weekly bathing and keeping a room, only for visitors, "for best" of Victorian times, some rebalance might be a good idea. Might even turn out to be good for skin and gut bacteria and the rise of eczema etc. What we don't have, as it's been gadgeted away, is downtime. Kids, and many adults, today can not cope with being bored (the normal state for kids in the 70s for perhaps an hour or two daily). I saw that very clearly with my own kids and all their friends over the years. What used to be a trigger for inventing a game, building a den, or making something new with lego is far more filled with minutes on YT. More and more we've filled every second with things to do - by "necessity" and by choice. In trying to make life easier most of us no longer seem to have time (or often inclination) to just chill watching the world go by for an hour a day. Seems it all got too fragmented.
  • sapphireblue 10y ago
    I also wonder how we manage to stay busy given that most home tasks (dishwashing, laundry, cleaning (roombas) and even cooking - see multicooker devices) are already automated, with "doing laundry" meaning merely loading and unloading the washing machine. I think you have a good point about idle time being gadgeted away. Also I think there is a tremendous potential in automation of physical labor (including remaining daily tasks). I wonder how much more free time we would have, if only 10% of workforce that currently does web/mobile/game apps (including myself) would apply their skills to automating their daily life with simple robots. Also, imagine relatively cheap mass-produced robots that have embedded computer vision and motion planning accessible via DOM-like API (with javascript, of course), and what would millions of web developers do with that, with their current javascript/DOM skills directly applicable to manipulating the physical world. Does it sound too good to be true? I don't know.
• hellofunk 10y ago
  Title should be "Why are American adults so busy?" Once you leave the U.S. and live in other nations for a while, in some of those you will quickly realize that the ideas and observations in this article are so clearly Americanized. Life doesn't have to be the way it is described here, and without giving up any contributions to the world or standard of living.
• Pica_soO 10y ago
  To prevent existential dread creeping in if you get a chance to contemplate the hamster wheel?
• deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
• kelukelugames 10y ago
  One of the perks of being an engineer is I can spend less on my attire and grooming. I shave once every two weeks. Most of the time I have a scruffy patchy beard. I love being lazy. The downside is I'm perpetuating a bad stereotype. Perhaps engineers would have higher social status if we dressed the part.
• shade23 10y ago
  But.These things are not a part of it.I will not call it multitasking.But an important part of my daily schedule is planning things to make sure that I avoid time where I just day dream,it could be waiting for a build process,washing clothes,cooking etc.While all these tasks are defined as "time-consuming",they basically require more efficient management(you can ask any working parent,they will be able to explain to you important time management becomes). So adults seem busy because they are doing more than one thing simultaneously(not to be mistaken with multitasking).
• zawarudo 10y ago
  This is probably a bit exaggerated. Like someone else mentioned, this is probably directed at adults that have children. Having children comes with loads more time-consuming responsibilities... not that I have any, but my sister complains a lot about that part.
• blueside 10y ago
  one thing i've learned over the years is that everyone isn't really as busy as they say they are. everyone is afraid of not sounding busy.
• ZoeZoeBee 10y ago
  Dirty Little Secret, They're not. The Average American Adult Spends 5.5 hrs a day watching video content, this adds up to 38.5 hrs a week. Allowing for 8 hrs of sleep a day, an average of 47 hrs a week working for a full time worker and you're left with 26.5 hrs to fulfill the requirements of adulthood listed in the article. The only mention of TV/media viewing came by way of the time spent to purchase one, never a mention of the amount of time spent on one. http://www.emarketer.com/Article/US-Adults-Spend-55-Hours-with-Video-Content-Each-Day/1012362 http://www.emarketer.com/Article/US-Adults-Spend-55-Hours-wi... You're not busy if you're watching a day and a half's worth of television every week. It's one of my pet peeves to hear people say their busy when so much time is devoted to a mindless activity. Imagine what could be accomplished if instead of turning on and tuning out, people choose to devote that time to side projects, gardening, some other creative hobby, or time spent enjoying nature and each others company.
• ChuckMcM 10y ago
  That was fun, we had a similar sort of discussion with our kids as they were growing up. My eldest was especially anxious to get to the level 'adult' and start her life. It wasn't everything she hoped it would be. I think its easy to pick apart the specific numbers but it is also a good way to think about how you want to spend your time vs how you do by default. And that will let you make decisions about optimizations and time/money trade offs. For example you can just eat Soylent and not cook at all (not a good tradeoff in my opinion) or automate bill paying and bill management. Living in a place without lawn care requirements vs living with some amount of garden. It also points out why married people (and people in committed relationships) have "more" free time as many of these jobs can be done for 2 people in the domicile in the same time as 1 person. So you can split them up and complete them in parallel, freeing up time.
• mwfunk 10y ago
  "Surely adults were doing something wrong if they were never bored." FWIW, I know plenty of adults that complain about boredom and they are most definitely the ones that are doing something wrong. Not because they aren't filling whatever free time they have with some other form of work, but because they don't know how to enjoy the free time that they get (lack of hobbies/interests/etc.), and/or they don't know how to relax and enjoy doing nothing. As people get older the concept of their own mortality becomes more and more tangible, which makes each moment seem more precious. To a kid being bored is an annoyance, but to an adult being bored is more like a lost opportunity at best and a personal failing at worst.
• Humjob 10y ago
  Some of these time claims are comically wrong. The average man spends nowhere near 90 minutes a day on 'attire and grooming.' Most people don't work out an hour a day either. Laundry? No way that's 2 hours per week. Most people don't cook every meal either. And making a sandwich or pouring a bowl of cereal sure as hell don't take 30 minutes. Here are some actual statistics that weren't randomly pulled out of my ass and subsequently upvoted on Hacker News: https://priceonomics.com/how-young-adults-spend-their-time-2004-vs-2014/ https://priceonomics.com/how-young-adults-spend-their-time-2...
  • stepvhen 10y ago
    The very idea that somebody takes half and hour each to exclusively cook and eat three meals a day is absurd for a number of reasons, e.g. leftovers, the act of eating and reading at once, sandwiches, meal planning, skipping lunch, very-american-pre-processed-food, rice cookers, toast, etc.
• johnward 10y ago
  They only accounted for 40 hours for work. What professional today is only spending 40 hours working and/or increasing their skills related to work? Especially if you are on HN. 2 hours for dependents? I take it that doesn't mean children? Another thing I will never understand is how so many of my fellow American Males can watch basically every football game during the week. Who has time for that? I don't even have a single friend outside of my family because it's just too time consuming.
  • tropo 10y ago
    In government, hours are often limited. For federal contractors, any extra hours must be paid (not legal to work for free) so normally it's only 40, or perhaps 47 at a real sleazy place.
• slaunchwise 10y ago
  The comments on this thread strike me as an unusually good portrait of the HN community. This is who we are, how we spend our time, how much diversity in these viewpoints we contain.
• morgante 10y ago
  Actually, I have found that my (young) adult life is the best time of my life and I have a giant excess of free time. I'm very lucky to be able to command a high hourly rate for software consulting. So I can work <40 hours a week and still earn enough to outsource 90% of the items on this list (cooking, cleaning, etc.). I definitely have way more free time now than I ever did as a student. Seriously, people always act as though students have an easy life. In my experience, I was much busier and less happy when I was in college. Not to mention that real work is, for me, much more meaningful than the fake work which constitutes most "education." Also, technology really has reduced a lot of these time demands. If you're still manually paying bills or balancing your finances, you really need to automate that. There's no reason to spend more than 15 minutes a week on that sort of thing.
  • dsfyu404ed 10y ago
    The people who act like students have an easy life are the students who partied their way through a psych degree and are stuck cleaning up the mess after the fact. The people who work their butt off in college (by some combination of working while going to school and going all out in a difficult major) usually have an increase in free time once they're only working 40 or 50hr per week and not bringing their work home every day.
• Globz 10y ago
  Trello is life and it is my goto to-do list!
• Pulce 10y ago
  Horror vacui.
• kevin_thibedeau 10y ago
  The average American watches more than four hours of television a day. That's where a good chunk of the time goes.
• kragen 10y ago
  I read this and I think that it mostly sounds like a list of self-created problems, largely arising from the author's vanity and poor impulse control, that need to be solved. The crucial #1 thing that's entirely missing from this list, though, is cultivating personal connections with other people. That's the thing about your life that most strongly determines your happiness, as well as your professional success, your educational opportunities, and your love life (obviously). And it's not just a matter of taking care of dependents (#13), because it involves people who aren't your dependents, too. This list implicitly relegates that to last place, behind ironing your shirts, fixing dents in your car, and fucking off at the gym. Don't do that. Spend time on connecting with other people every day. Help them. Listen to them. Work with them. Play with them. If you don't, your life is going to be terrible, no matter how much money you have, how clean your toilet is, or how up-to-date your sound system is. I'm not speaking theoretically here, although there's lots of psychological theory backing up what I'm saying. I knew a number of people who killed themselves. Don't be the next one. Connect. On your deathbed you aren't going to wish you'd owned a more complete set of cutlery. And this is, in my experience, the biggest difference from childhood — you have to deliberately connect with people, because it doesn't happen by default. As a child, your parents will invite people to your birthday party. As an adult, if you don't invite people to your birthday party, you won't have a birthday party. This is more an opportunity than a burden, because it means you choose who to create connections with. What about the rest of this stupid list? I'm going to mention my life from time to time in what's below, but I don't want you to get the wrong idea. I'm far from a paragon, of self-discipline or anything else. I'm not holding my life up as a model to be emulated, although it does reflect my own values to some extent. I'm saying, if even I can do this shit, any fucking idiot can do it. Probably you can do better. 1. "Have money". Okay, I like to have money. I like to work, too. I've paid my own way (and sometimes some other people's ways) since I was 18; I've been lucky in that this has been a lot easier for me than for most people. But honestly, I haven't been shallow enough to equate financial independence with adulthood since I was about 12. Housewives aren't adults? But I was an adult when I was paying my rent by working at Taco Bell? Please. How much you have to work to make a living has a lot to do with how much you spend and how much you can bill. Financially independent people's spending, even in the US, varies from a few thousand dollars a year up to hundreds of thousands, without even getting into the super-wealthy. Workers get paid anywhere from US$10 per hour (or even less for prisoners and illegal aliens) up to US$1000 per hour or more. Outside the US, the variation is even greater. Don't tell me that across this entire range of expenses and earnings you have to work "40–60 hours a week" in order to have money. You work that number of hours because it's the norm, not because your living expenses magically adjust to match your earnings within 15%. Then, you spend however much you make, instead of what you need, because you're a fucking idiot. I've been there too, man. It sucks. But you can stop doing that, unless you're at the bottom of the income distribution or have extra expenses. 2. "Cooking." You can totally cook if you want to. Cooking is an enjoyable activity, and feeding people even more so. But you definitely don't have to spend half an hour cooking breakfast every day if you're short on time. Boil half a dozen eggs on Sunday night, have an egg and a banana for breakfast each morning. Make a casserole on Saturday, eat slices for dinner all week. Have peanut-butter sandwiches and salad for lunch. Cook dinner for yourself, a partner, and two friends; then you only cook dinner one out of every four times, unless you somehow get slotted into a housewife role. Boil eggs, chopped onion, and cheese in a Ziploc bag to make a Ziploc omelet. Chop vegetables on Tuesday night and use the vegetables in food for the rest of the week. Use dried onion and garlic in bottles. Make three liters of cooked rice and eat from it the rest of the week, or use a rice cooker. Keep a seasoned salt mix in a shaker. Keep oils for cooking in squirt bottles with conical nozzles next to the stove. Make a big batch of curry, pack it into a dozen big Ziploc bags, and freeze them all with separators in between. My breakfast this morning was canned mackerel, wheat crackers, and a peanut bar; lunch was instant noodles. (I'm trying not eating after midday this week, although I'm buying the food rather than begging for it in the street in the traditional way.) 3. "Laundry." Don't dry-clean your own clothes, as the article bizarrely suggests; that's dangerous enough to outsource to a specialized company. Don't fold your clothes except on special occasions; wear knits instead. Wear your clothes twice before washing. Wear flip-flops instead of socks. Synthetics dry faster, but I can't wear them more than once; I can wear silk, wool, or cotton twice. You can get laundry down to 20 minutes a week (per person) if you have a washing machine. 4. "Cleaning." This is largely a matter of how much living space you have, although yeah, I probably spend a few hours a week washing dishes. When my then wife and I lived in a van, we sure as hell didn't spend 5 hours a week each cleaning it. We probably didn't spend two hours a week between the two of us. (We did have to spend a lot of hours fixing it, though...) 5. "Buying stuff." This is the only one on the list that actually saves you time — buying bookshelves is a hell of a lot faster than making them, not to mention toothpaste. But I've still wasted a terrible fraction of my life on it. You can reduce the time you waste on buying things by buying in bulk, often by buying online, by buying things that last, and by possessing less. (If you are poor, you may find yourself obliged to possess a great many things, just in case; but if you are not poor, you can take advantage of the opportunity afforded by your money to only buy the things you do need.) 6. "Bills." My roommate and I have six bills: rent, internet+telephone, gas, electricity, water, and property tax. Most of these come once every two months. (The property tax we can pay yearly.) It definitely doesn't take us 16 hours every two months between the two of us to track and pay them. Don't live alone; that's a stupid waste of time. Of course, if you pick the wrong roommate, you could waste a lot more than 16 hours arguing... but that hasn't been a problem. 7. "Small errands." Yes, these can take an unbounded amount of time. Avoid them as much as possible. A lot of these come from your possessions and bills. 8. "Transport." Yes, it's easy to waste hours a day on transport (to say nothing of the time you work to pay off a car loan). I live 20 minutes away from my office by public transit or bicycle. Usually I read or write on the bus; sometimes it's too crowded. About once a month, I have to top up the transit pass. This is a 45-second cash transaction at the ticket counter in the subway station. I should probably spend a couple of hours getting my bicycle back in working order, because it's often more convenient. It's easy to get into a position where you're spending two or four or six hours a day on transport, and worse, transport that consumes your entire attention. If you're in that position, recognize that it's an urgent problem and you need to get out of it. Only isolation from other human beings is more psychologically damaging than long commutes, and only serious illness wastes more time. 9. Exercise. (The article says "staying healthy", but ⓐ that's a lost cause, you're going to fucking die just like everybody else, and ⓑ eating is already point #2.) What the fuck is wrong with you that you drive a car to a job five days a week and then lack exercise? How about walking a little bit? I walk about a kilometer a day to get to the bus or subway, two or three kilometers most days. If I bike to work and back that's five kilometers. Also you could work (in the traditional sense of the word). I'm sure there's something in your house that could use some elbow grease. A few weeks ago I was also taking the stairs the fifty meters up to the office — this takes four minutes. I think I'll start again tomorrow.
• kkoomi 10y ago
  That's why I hate full-time employment. It is shocking that people haven't revolted when the majority have to devote much more than a majority of their time to work and errands, even not including time for offspring. When I make kids (my pokémon if you will), I plan to sit'em down and ELI5 what life is like for the average adult. I will work with them develop their own income streams, based on things they are passionate about. This way, they can avoid a life of modern slavery.
• BigGillyStyle 10y ago
  To me the struggle is the rare collision of having both free time and ANY energy at the point the free time comes. Most of my energy goes into all those other buckets. I can see why some people just stare at a TV (which I don't have) or do other passive entertainment (which I'm sure I do). To be fair to myself...I do exercise (usually biking) 1-2 hours every day, which some will classify as "free time". While it is often enjoyable, I don't consider it an optional, spontaneous, or random endeavor...which is usually what I consider "free" (or "unplanned") time.