12 ms·

German Union Steps Up Fight for ‘Modern’ 28-Hour Workweek

243 points by joeyespo 9y ago

eganist 9y ago
I mean, as automation takes over and more of the work becomes knowledge work, this next step doesn't surprise me much. Shoot, I work at a firm that offers something like 2 months off when bundling paid time off together with corporate holidays, and that's not including all the other tiny time-off incentives that are included that don't necessarily get advertised to new hires. We're headed in that direction as it is.
- horsecaptin 9y ago
  What is your company's name?
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- aphextron 9y ago
  >Shoot, I work at a firm that offers something like 2 months off when bundling paid time off together with corporate holidays, and that's not including all the other tiny time-off incentives that are included that don't necessarily get advertised to new hires. We're headed in that direction as it is. Same here. I can't remember the last time I worked a 40 hour week. And the amount of actual work getting done on any given Friday is essentially zero. I have no doubt the company would do better by just closing the office 3 days a week.
  - andreimackenzie 9y ago
    I don't think this is the norm. My experience is at least as anecdotal, but most of my friends in tech seem to work pretty hard.
    - iagooar 9y ago
      They work hard, or they work a lot of hours?
      - carlmr 9y ago
        Even if they work hard, their output might be low quality.
- marnett 9y ago
  While I agree, knowledge workers shouldn't have to work 40 hours a week (due to simple cost-benefit of their true output), it just isn't the observed reality in most knowledge-work industries (at least in America). I wouldn't be surprised that, in 50 years, tech has gone the way of finance, where, in order to attain that highly coveted lifestyle, you have to be willing to work 90+ hours a week at the beginning of your career, just to flatline to the comparably reasonable 60+ hours when you progress. This trend is already the norm in large tech companies with regard to their new hires; just throw heads at the problem, as long as it meets the deadline nothing else matters.
  - carlmr 9y ago
    Except that we consistently see that hours don't equal output in knowledge work. Northern European industry has been thriving on 35h work weeks.
  - skgoa 9y ago
    35-38 hours pers week is the observed reality in Germany, though. 90+ hours is virtually unheard of here. As is working on a Saturday. In fact 60+ is already seen as inhumane. As soon as you work 50 hours in any given week, the employer will have to pay you much more money. Hence, at my employer I literally am not allowed to work more than 48 hours per week and only Mon-Fri, unless the project is in extremely bad shape. And even then I would have to put in an application and the worker's council might or might not approve it on a case to case basis. We also have a law in Germany that forces employers to allow employees to reduce their hours. I believe down to 30 hours per week. This entails reduced pay of course, but still a growing number of my colleagues are opting for this or are seriously considering it. And I'm talking about people in their thirties who are in the prime of their career. You can have a very comfortable life working 30 hours on an engineer's pay grade.
samwillis 9y ago
The title is a little unclear. They are asking for the right for union members to switch from their current 35hr week to a 28hr week for a two year period then switch back. Sounds good for young family or other family situations.
- cmdkeen 9y ago
  It's also asking that employers top up their salary whilst doing so, that appears to be the sticking point with employers. It is a major step beyond the state doing the subsidising, as can happen with maternity/paternity pay. It also strikes me as one of those measures that assumes that the good times (good order books, low unemployment) are here to stay. It rather feels like they're making themselves a hostage to fortune. Given some of Germany's success has come from the Euro reducing what would otherwise be appreciative effects on the deutschmark, it is worth remembering that governments / states are happy to benefit when the factors beyond their control are positive, less so when they turn against you.
  - ddebernardy 9y ago
    > It also strikes me as one of those measures that assumes that the good times (good order books, low unemployment) are here to stay. 42 people holding as much wealth as 3.7 billion might also have something to do with it: https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2018/jan/22/inequality-gap-widens-as-42-people-hold-same-wealth-as-37bn-poorest https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2018/jan/22/inequalit...
    - padobson 9y ago
      The inequality doesn't bother me so much, but I do think such inequality gives labor a bargaining position - a position the union in this article is wisely using to its advantage.
      - marnett 9y ago
        why is it that inequality doesn't bother you so much?
tabeth 9y ago
Unfortunately unless worldwide culture changes such that demand for produced goods drops dramatically in favor for intangibles (humanities, happiness, etc.) any small union that does this will basically become irrelevant in no short time. It's important to note that the union in the OP has huge leverage. It seems this kind of action is only possible for certain organizations in certain circumstances. In '95 this same organization was able to get down to a 35hr work week, but it's worth noting that metal is relatively expensive to ship and they're the largest union so there are some unique circumstances here. EDIT: Seems my point is misunderstood. It's not that people shouldn't strive for less hours, it is that a sufficiently large amount of leverage is really the only way these things happen. Given that there's plenty of retaliation against those who try to unionize, it's pretty critical that they have plenty of leverage, first.
- sophistry 9y ago
  > Unfortunately unless worldwide culture changes such that demand for produced goods drops dramatically in favor for intangibles (humanities, happiness, etc.) any small union that does this will basically become irrelevant in no short time. It's important to note that the union in the OP has huge leverage. This is exactly the theory behind socialism. Capitalism is great at increasing our productivity, but past a certain point, you can't continue valuing productivity more than worker happiness. Socialism is less efficient than capitalism, even Marx admitted that, but at some point it begins to make sense to shift our values. When will that point be? Probably not yet, maybe not as soon as people think, but probably not never. If the metalworking industry is productive enough so that it makes sense to shift their values, then more power to them.
  - carlmr 9y ago
    The problem with shifting to socialism completely is lack of incentives. Also central planning doesn't work. Voting with money by what you buy has shown to be a much better planner than any government could hope to achieve. What we need to do is change the mindset of what is considered a normal workweek. The shift from 7 to 6 to 5 days and 14h days to 8h or 7h days was also a change in mindset more than a change in political system. In a capitalist system you also need the mindset of most people to change at the same time. I mean a lot of things that we need for living that have a somewhat constant demand (rent/house prices, food, toilet paper, ..) will have the price at which profit is maximal. Which is why with the advent of women working you didn't have families with two incomes being able to afford twice as many houses, but families with one income not being able to compete with two income families to buy a house. The prices of necessities will always adapt to what people can afford. If everyone switched to a 28h workweek at the same time, it wouldn't be a very big problem because all the other prices would adapt and you could afford the same basic lifestyle with a bit more basic luxuries. If you're the only one switching you can't afford a basic lifestyle anymore.
matt4077 9y ago
This is obviously intended mostly as an opening salvo in negotiations, and has little chance to become reality. But there are similar ideas that seem almost like common sense, yet are pretty rare in reality: A right to reduce hours to, say, 50% minimum could seriously improve quality of life for many. Of course you'd need some sensible limitations, i. e. a restriction to larger companies where any fluctuations would average out. But I've seen quite a few workplaces succeed with such a model. "Sabbatical" programs (get 85% of your pay for 7 years, with the last year paid but free of work) have even less impact on work.
- ghaff 9y ago
  One of the challenges is that the cost of a lot of benefits would stay the same even if someone worked a 20 hour week and was paid 50% of their full-time salary. So you're left with potentially higher employee costs, cutting the salary more than 50% to work half-time, or cutting out benefits for part-time workers.
  - carlmr 9y ago
    This doesn't really make sense. They would be paying out the same before taxes, just spread out over more years. What you get as an employee might even be higher because taxes are progressive. This is of course assuming a European social system where health insurance etc. is taxes, so they're just a percentage of salary, not a fixed cost.
    - skgoa 9y ago
      Employers do have fixed costs per employee. E.g. office space, a desk a computer, accident insurance etc. Fewer employees working more hours each is cheaper than more employees working fewer hours. Even paying me 1.5x for overtime hours turns out to be financially beneficial for my employer once you figure in fixed costs.
- germanier 9y ago
  Germany already has the right to reduce working hours (for companies with over 15 employees). Employers need to cite a very good reason to refuse the request. However, you don't have the right to ramp up yours hours later on (but if there is an open vacancy later, you need to be preferred).
kome 9y ago
Like France. Nice! That's the future.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- ucaetano 9y ago
  > Nice! That's the future. I've seen the "future" in France, nothing "nice" about it. Permanently hiring someone (and emphasis on the permanent, firing someone on a CDI contract is extremely costly, far easier just to leave someone without work but still pay them until they quit) is so expensive that almost all new jobs (~85% actually) are for temporary contracts limited by law to 12 months. 65% are for <1 month contracts. Think about it: 2 in every 3 people who get a job offer in France this week will be unemployed in a month. And that's before we get into the cost of employment. An employee in France making the country's average wage costs the employer (in absolute terms) almost the same than an employee in Switzerland making that country's average income (which in PPP is higher than France's). I did the math a while back, and after accounting for all taxes, social security and fees, the Swiss employee is making 70% to pocket (in PPP) than the French one, despite costing almost the same to the company. If you have to hire an employee, where would you hire, France or Switzerland?
  - alkonaut 9y ago
    > so expensive that almost all new jobs (~85% actually) are for temporary contracts limited by law to 12 months. 65% are for <1 month contracts. A sign that the use of temporary contracts should also be a focus, just like wages and work hours. This is harder though. > you have to hire an employee, where would you hire, France or Switzerland? That depends...
    - ucaetano 9y ago
      > A sign that the use of temporary contracts should also be a focus, just like wages and work hours. This is harder though. They use temporary contracts because permanent contracts are too expensive. Making temporary contracts (which were actually created to flexibilize hiring) more expensive won't solve that issue. > That depends... I guess we both know the answer to that question. All other factors being the same, where would you hire? Now look at the unemployment rate in those two countries. Why do you think that is?
zwieback 9y ago
The reason employers in Germany are against this proposal is that currently it's hard to find qualified employees to backfill the gaps. They'd rather pay individuals more than hire more replacement workers. A byproduct of the unusually low unemployment rate and booming economy in Germany right now. The situation might be the reverse in a few years.
- trhway 9y ago
  Immigration would help :)
  - ben_w 9y ago
    Fortunately there are quite a lot of people in the UK who are wondering which country they’ll be living in around 14 months from now.
  - anarazel 9y ago
    It's not like Germany doesn't have immigration... There's the whole pool of the EU who can pretty much immediately start working in Germany. Immigration for skilled workers in Germany with employment prospect is far easier than for a lot of other countries (certainly easier than e.g. into the US). There's also a significant influx into the work pool from refugees and asylum seekers, although that should certainly happen more smoothly and with more support.
  - _Codemonkeyism 9y ago
    Companies I consult are looking all over Europe and have employer branding efforts running in the whole of the EU.
    - ccozan 9y ago
      ..and they still require fluent spoken German! This drives me crazy. I could fill a lot of open positions right now. Oops, your candidate does't speak German. I really really don't understand.
jnordwick 9y ago
This article is over 3 weeks old talking of warning strikes to begin 2 weeks ago. Something more current couldn't be found, at least after the warning strikes were to begin or did begin.
- germanier 9y ago
  There were warning strikes and negotiations are set to begin this week.
  - carlmr 9y ago
    I could see them yesterday on my way to work. They're well underway.
sharpercoder 9y ago
It has become clear to me that sub-40 hour work weeks don't really work from many perspectives. The most important factor is that many jobs require a minimum degree of attention. More focus does translate into better results. So instead of sub-40 hour work weeks, we should maybe introduce partial yearly roles. So for example if you want to do 30 hours per week, simply work 3/4 weeks per year (39 of 52), but do work these weeks 40h.
- padobson 9y ago
  I've always found I am most productive during short, intense intervals. A 40 hour work week for 50 weeks a year is 2000 hrs. I've never been able to do it, but I believe I could be far far more productive working 25, 80-hour weeks or 20, 100-hour weeks - probably split into two or three separate chunks.
- news_to_me 9y ago
  > It has become clear to me that sub-40 hour work weeks don't really work from many perspectives Can you elaborate? This seems interesting and not intuitive to me. Personally, I feel more productive at around 20-30 hrs/wk
  - sharpercoder 9y ago
    1) I personally need a certain amount of focus to be really productive. Pure focus on one thing with enough "cadence" brings me in the zone. 2) Employers often have the idea as well. Although part-time jobs grow year-over-year, the ones getting promotions are still usually the employees dedicated 40 fulltime. I don't know if this is just a matter of perspective or based on tangible results (e.g. proven better productivity). 3) The "10 000 hour rule" I should emphasize that the 40 hours should be spend well and the employee should use enough time for relaxation, rest and leasure. 40 hours for e.g. a head of family in busy waters may quickly be detrimental.
    - carlmr 9y ago
      If you ask me a 40h workweek is very susceptible to Parkinson's law >work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion I'm less focused sometimes because I know I have time to do something than if I know I don't. And I might be doing more work if I had less hours to fill and knew I had to use them.
tomohawk 9y ago
I'm blessed with work. I'm glad I don't have some union telling me I can only work 28 hours a week. In the good times, the steel workers union got great benefits from Bethlehem Steel. Those times changed, and all those people lost their jobs. Tens of thousands of jobs never coming back.
- fwdpropaganda 9y ago
  > I'm glad I don't have some union telling me I can only work 28 hours a week. There's always a guy that comments without reading the article. Don't be that guy.
  - tomohawk 9y ago
    No, I'm a guy who lives in the US and knows how unions in the US are.
    - Daishiman 9y ago
      And you clearly don't know how the unions in Germany are, so why are you even commenting?
- jhoechtl 9y ago
  I bet you are a white anglo-saxon republican, who has a lot to loose (or at least thinks he has a lot to loose). What would be you reaction if I tell you that I can make a living without any work at all and that I call that pure luxury?
  - freedomben 9y ago
    > I bet you are a white anglo-saxon republican, who has a lot to loose (or at least thinks he has a lot to loose). I guess racism is fine when directed at a supposed white person. Amazing that you can determine a person's race based solely on their opinion, and even more amazing that you found it relevant. And what if he/she isn't white? Does that make his/her thinking wrong? Did he/she step off the plantation? Why is a person's ethnicity at all relevant here? Should we all declare our skin colors in our profile so you can properly analyze our arguments based on your prejudice?
fao_ 9y ago
I'm happy that at least one country has unions that are going strong. It seems that in the UK they self-destructed (Thanks, Labour party...), and the US has never really had strong labour unions.
ancorevard 9y ago
This explains today's tarnished image of German engineering. It really hurts me to see what's happening with the engineering found at Volkswagen et al.

243 points by joeyespo 9y ago

I mean, as automation takes over and more of the work becomes knowledge work, this next step doesn't surprise me much. Shoot, I work at a firm that offers something like 2 months off when bundling paid time off together with corporate holidays, and that's not including all the other tiny time-off incentives that are included that don't necessarily get advertised to new hires. We're headed in that direction as it is.

horsecaptin 9y ago
What is your company's name?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
aphextron 9y ago
>Shoot, I work at a firm that offers something like 2 months off when bundling paid time off together with corporate holidays, and that's not including all the other tiny time-off incentives that are included that don't necessarily get advertised to new hires. We're headed in that direction as it is. Same here. I can't remember the last time I worked a 40 hour week. And the amount of actual work getting done on any given Friday is essentially zero. I have no doubt the company would do better by just closing the office 3 days a week.
- andreimackenzie 9y ago
  I don't think this is the norm. My experience is at least as anecdotal, but most of my friends in tech seem to work pretty hard.
  - iagooar 9y ago
    They work hard, or they work a lot of hours?
    - carlmr 9y ago
      Even if they work hard, their output might be low quality.
marnett 9y ago
While I agree, knowledge workers shouldn't have to work 40 hours a week (due to simple cost-benefit of their true output), it just isn't the observed reality in most knowledge-work industries (at least in America). I wouldn't be surprised that, in 50 years, tech has gone the way of finance, where, in order to attain that highly coveted lifestyle, you have to be willing to work 90+ hours a week at the beginning of your career, just to flatline to the comparably reasonable 60+ hours when you progress. This trend is already the norm in large tech companies with regard to their new hires; just throw heads at the problem, as long as it meets the deadline nothing else matters.
- carlmr 9y ago
  Except that we consistently see that hours don't equal output in knowledge work. Northern European industry has been thriving on 35h work weeks.
- skgoa 9y ago
  35-38 hours pers week is the observed reality in Germany, though. 90+ hours is virtually unheard of here. As is working on a Saturday. In fact 60+ is already seen as inhumane. As soon as you work 50 hours in any given week, the employer will have to pay you much more money. Hence, at my employer I literally am not allowed to work more than 48 hours per week and only Mon-Fri, unless the project is in extremely bad shape. And even then I would have to put in an application and the worker's council might or might not approve it on a case to case basis. We also have a law in Germany that forces employers to allow employees to reduce their hours. I believe down to 30 hours per week. This entails reduced pay of course, but still a growing number of my colleagues are opting for this or are seriously considering it. And I'm talking about people in their thirties who are in the prime of their career. You can have a very comfortable life working 30 hours on an engineer's pay grade.

samwillis 9y ago

The title is a little unclear. They are asking for the right for union members to switch from their current 35hr week to a 28hr week for a two year period then switch back. Sounds good for young family or other family situations.

cmdkeen 9y ago
It's also asking that employers top up their salary whilst doing so, that appears to be the sticking point with employers. It is a major step beyond the state doing the subsidising, as can happen with maternity/paternity pay. It also strikes me as one of those measures that assumes that the good times (good order books, low unemployment) are here to stay. It rather feels like they're making themselves a hostage to fortune. Given some of Germany's success has come from the Euro reducing what would otherwise be appreciative effects on the deutschmark, it is worth remembering that governments / states are happy to benefit when the factors beyond their control are positive, less so when they turn against you.
- ddebernardy 9y ago
  > It also strikes me as one of those measures that assumes that the good times (good order books, low unemployment) are here to stay. 42 people holding as much wealth as 3.7 billion might also have something to do with it: https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2018/jan/22/inequality-gap-widens-as-42-people-hold-same-wealth-as-37bn-poorest https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2018/jan/22/inequalit...
  - padobson 9y ago
    The inequality doesn't bother me so much, but I do think such inequality gives labor a bargaining position - a position the union in this article is wisely using to its advantage.
    - marnett 9y ago
      why is it that inequality doesn't bother you so much?

tabeth 9y ago

Unfortunately unless worldwide culture changes such that demand for produced goods drops dramatically in favor for intangibles (humanities, happiness, etc.) any small union that does this will basically become irrelevant in no short time. It's important to note that the union in the OP has huge leverage. It seems this kind of action is only possible for certain organizations in certain circumstances. In '95 this same organization was able to get down to a 35hr work week, but it's worth noting that metal is relatively expensive to ship and they're the largest union so there are some unique circumstances here. EDIT: Seems my point is misunderstood. It's not that people shouldn't strive for less hours, it is that a sufficiently large amount of leverage is really the only way these things happen. Given that there's plenty of retaliation against those who try to unionize, it's pretty critical that they have plenty of leverage, first.

sophistry 9y ago
> Unfortunately unless worldwide culture changes such that demand for produced goods drops dramatically in favor for intangibles (humanities, happiness, etc.) any small union that does this will basically become irrelevant in no short time. It's important to note that the union in the OP has huge leverage. This is exactly the theory behind socialism. Capitalism is great at increasing our productivity, but past a certain point, you can't continue valuing productivity more than worker happiness. Socialism is less efficient than capitalism, even Marx admitted that, but at some point it begins to make sense to shift our values. When will that point be? Probably not yet, maybe not as soon as people think, but probably not never. If the metalworking industry is productive enough so that it makes sense to shift their values, then more power to them.
- carlmr 9y ago
  The problem with shifting to socialism completely is lack of incentives. Also central planning doesn't work. Voting with money by what you buy has shown to be a much better planner than any government could hope to achieve. What we need to do is change the mindset of what is considered a normal workweek. The shift from 7 to 6 to 5 days and 14h days to 8h or 7h days was also a change in mindset more than a change in political system. In a capitalist system you also need the mindset of most people to change at the same time. I mean a lot of things that we need for living that have a somewhat constant demand (rent/house prices, food, toilet paper, ..) will have the price at which profit is maximal. Which is why with the advent of women working you didn't have families with two incomes being able to afford twice as many houses, but families with one income not being able to compete with two income families to buy a house. The prices of necessities will always adapt to what people can afford. If everyone switched to a 28h workweek at the same time, it wouldn't be a very big problem because all the other prices would adapt and you could afford the same basic lifestyle with a bit more basic luxuries. If you're the only one switching you can't afford a basic lifestyle anymore.

matt4077 9y ago

This is obviously intended mostly as an opening salvo in negotiations, and has little chance to become reality. But there are similar ideas that seem almost like common sense, yet are pretty rare in reality: A right to reduce hours to, say, 50% minimum could seriously improve quality of life for many. Of course you'd need some sensible limitations, i. e. a restriction to larger companies where any fluctuations would average out. But I've seen quite a few workplaces succeed with such a model. "Sabbatical" programs (get 85% of your pay for 7 years, with the last year paid but free of work) have even less impact on work.

ghaff 9y ago
One of the challenges is that the cost of a lot of benefits would stay the same even if someone worked a 20 hour week and was paid 50% of their full-time salary. So you're left with potentially higher employee costs, cutting the salary more than 50% to work half-time, or cutting out benefits for part-time workers.
- carlmr 9y ago
  This doesn't really make sense. They would be paying out the same before taxes, just spread out over more years. What you get as an employee might even be higher because taxes are progressive. This is of course assuming a European social system where health insurance etc. is taxes, so they're just a percentage of salary, not a fixed cost.
  - skgoa 9y ago
    Employers do have fixed costs per employee. E.g. office space, a desk a computer, accident insurance etc. Fewer employees working more hours each is cheaper than more employees working fewer hours. Even paying me 1.5x for overtime hours turns out to be financially beneficial for my employer once you figure in fixed costs.
germanier 9y ago
Germany already has the right to reduce working hours (for companies with over 15 employees). Employers need to cite a very good reason to refuse the request. However, you don't have the right to ramp up yours hours later on (but if there is an open vacancy later, you need to be preferred).

kome 9y ago

Like France. Nice! That's the future.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
ucaetano 9y ago
> Nice! That's the future. I've seen the "future" in France, nothing "nice" about it. Permanently hiring someone (and emphasis on the permanent, firing someone on a CDI contract is extremely costly, far easier just to leave someone without work but still pay them until they quit) is so expensive that almost all new jobs (~85% actually) are for temporary contracts limited by law to 12 months. 65% are for <1 month contracts. Think about it: 2 in every 3 people who get a job offer in France this week will be unemployed in a month. And that's before we get into the cost of employment. An employee in France making the country's average wage costs the employer (in absolute terms) almost the same than an employee in Switzerland making that country's average income (which in PPP is higher than France's). I did the math a while back, and after accounting for all taxes, social security and fees, the Swiss employee is making 70% to pocket (in PPP) than the French one, despite costing almost the same to the company. If you have to hire an employee, where would you hire, France or Switzerland?
- alkonaut 9y ago
  > so expensive that almost all new jobs (~85% actually) are for temporary contracts limited by law to 12 months. 65% are for <1 month contracts. A sign that the use of temporary contracts should also be a focus, just like wages and work hours. This is harder though. > you have to hire an employee, where would you hire, France or Switzerland? That depends...
  - ucaetano 9y ago
    > A sign that the use of temporary contracts should also be a focus, just like wages and work hours. This is harder though. They use temporary contracts because permanent contracts are too expensive. Making temporary contracts (which were actually created to flexibilize hiring) more expensive won't solve that issue. > That depends... I guess we both know the answer to that question. All other factors being the same, where would you hire? Now look at the unemployment rate in those two countries. Why do you think that is?

zwieback 9y ago

The reason employers in Germany are against this proposal is that currently it's hard to find qualified employees to backfill the gaps. They'd rather pay individuals more than hire more replacement workers. A byproduct of the unusually low unemployment rate and booming economy in Germany right now. The situation might be the reverse in a few years.

trhway 9y ago
Immigration would help :)
- ben_w 9y ago
  Fortunately there are quite a lot of people in the UK who are wondering which country they’ll be living in around 14 months from now.
- anarazel 9y ago
  It's not like Germany doesn't have immigration... There's the whole pool of the EU who can pretty much immediately start working in Germany. Immigration for skilled workers in Germany with employment prospect is far easier than for a lot of other countries (certainly easier than e.g. into the US). There's also a significant influx into the work pool from refugees and asylum seekers, although that should certainly happen more smoothly and with more support.
- _Codemonkeyism 9y ago
  Companies I consult are looking all over Europe and have employer branding efforts running in the whole of the EU.
  - ccozan 9y ago
    ..and they still require fluent spoken German! This drives me crazy. I could fill a lot of open positions right now. Oops, your candidate does't speak German. I really really don't understand.

jnordwick 9y ago

This article is over 3 weeks old talking of warning strikes to begin 2 weeks ago. Something more current couldn't be found, at least after the warning strikes were to begin or did begin.

germanier 9y ago
There were warning strikes and negotiations are set to begin this week.
- carlmr 9y ago
  I could see them yesterday on my way to work. They're well underway.

sharpercoder 9y ago

It has become clear to me that sub-40 hour work weeks don't really work from many perspectives. The most important factor is that many jobs require a minimum degree of attention. More focus does translate into better results. So instead of sub-40 hour work weeks, we should maybe introduce partial yearly roles. So for example if you want to do 30 hours per week, simply work 3/4 weeks per year (39 of 52), but do work these weeks 40h.

padobson 9y ago
I've always found I am most productive during short, intense intervals. A 40 hour work week for 50 weeks a year is 2000 hrs. I've never been able to do it, but I believe I could be far far more productive working 25, 80-hour weeks or 20, 100-hour weeks - probably split into two or three separate chunks.
news_to_me 9y ago
> It has become clear to me that sub-40 hour work weeks don't really work from many perspectives Can you elaborate? This seems interesting and not intuitive to me. Personally, I feel more productive at around 20-30 hrs/wk
- sharpercoder 9y ago
  1) I personally need a certain amount of focus to be really productive. Pure focus on one thing with enough "cadence" brings me in the zone. 2) Employers often have the idea as well. Although part-time jobs grow year-over-year, the ones getting promotions are still usually the employees dedicated 40 fulltime. I don't know if this is just a matter of perspective or based on tangible results (e.g. proven better productivity). 3) The "10 000 hour rule" I should emphasize that the 40 hours should be spend well and the employee should use enough time for relaxation, rest and leasure. 40 hours for e.g. a head of family in busy waters may quickly be detrimental.
  - carlmr 9y ago
    If you ask me a 40h workweek is very susceptible to Parkinson's law >work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion I'm less focused sometimes because I know I have time to do something than if I know I don't. And I might be doing more work if I had less hours to fill and knew I had to use them.

tomohawk 9y ago

I'm blessed with work. I'm glad I don't have some union telling me I can only work 28 hours a week. In the good times, the steel workers union got great benefits from Bethlehem Steel. Those times changed, and all those people lost their jobs. Tens of thousands of jobs never coming back.

fwdpropaganda 9y ago
> I'm glad I don't have some union telling me I can only work 28 hours a week. There's always a guy that comments without reading the article. Don't be that guy.
- tomohawk 9y ago
  No, I'm a guy who lives in the US and knows how unions in the US are.
  - Daishiman 9y ago
    And you clearly don't know how the unions in Germany are, so why are you even commenting?
jhoechtl 9y ago
I bet you are a white anglo-saxon republican, who has a lot to loose (or at least thinks he has a lot to loose). What would be you reaction if I tell you that I can make a living without any work at all and that I call that pure luxury?
- freedomben 9y ago
  > I bet you are a white anglo-saxon republican, who has a lot to loose (or at least thinks he has a lot to loose). I guess racism is fine when directed at a supposed white person. Amazing that you can determine a person's race based solely on their opinion, and even more amazing that you found it relevant. And what if he/she isn't white? Does that make his/her thinking wrong? Did he/she step off the plantation? Why is a person's ethnicity at all relevant here? Should we all declare our skin colors in our profile so you can properly analyze our arguments based on your prejudice?

fao_ 9y ago

I'm happy that at least one country has unions that are going strong. It seems that in the UK they self-destructed (Thanks, Labour party...), and the US has never really had strong labour unions.

ancorevard 9y ago

This explains today's tarnished image of German engineering. It really hurts me to see what's happening with the engineering found at Volkswagen et al.