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What about truckers? Should they transport 25% less miles per day? Should elementary schooldays be shortened by 25%? Should companies cut their customer service

by nhebb 8y ago

What about truckers? Should they transport 25% less miles per day? Should elementary schooldays be shortened by 25%? Should companies cut their customer service hours by 25%? Should manufacturing companies drop their daily output by 25%? It might work well for some fields (e.g., programming), but for the general labor force this idea doesn't seem like a very well thought.

aqme28 8y ago
6 hour shifts fit into 24 hours just as well as 8 hour shifts do. You just need one more. And how long is elementary school? 8AM-3PM? If teachers weren't often required to do work outside of class, those hours sound pretty reasonable.
knodi123 8y ago
> Should elementary schooldays be shortened by 25%? Mine already did. Early dismissal at around 12:30 every friday. Thank goodness I have a stay-at-home mom for a wife, because I don't know how you're supposed to deal with that and also have a job. Actually I do know- they offer paid daycare on fridays. It's still a little silly.
- dsnuh 8y ago
  Same here. My kids have early dismissal every Wednesday. The winter and spring breaks are 4 weeks(!!!). They schedule "open house" type events which you are expected to attend monthly at 2:30pm on a Friday. I'm very lucky that I have support from family and an employer that is very accommodating to my schedule, as I am a divorced dad with a full time job.
augbog 8y ago
It looks like the link to the claim of shortening the work day is based on how schools for children aren't as long as the adult workday so I think your second question is already being applied right now. "In the LinkedIn post, Grant was weighing in on an Atlantic article about the time gap between when school and work days end, a bane for many parents. But it's not the first time Grant has given his stamp of approval to less work with more productivity."
- nhebb 8y ago
  Not really. In my area, the school day is 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Teachers typically arrive by 7:30 AM and leave around 3:30 PM - and then do grading and other work activities in their evenings. Where do you cut 25% from that? Who watches the kids - especially in some communities where single parent households are the norm? If the state provides daycare, the money has to come from somewhere, and school budgets are stretched as is. The workday reduction is a bit hand-wavy - it sounds good on the surface but when you get into the nitty gritty.
  - Apocryphon 8y ago
    There’s already been an abundance of studies concluding that American school begins too early and kids aren’t sleeping enough. https://www.cdc.gov/features/school-start-times/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/features/school-start-times/index.html
gdubs 8y ago
Probably similar to the concerns people voiced when the 40hr week was proposed, but then it went on to actually increase productivity (largely attributed to an overall healthier, better rested, less accident prone workforce.) Source: R. Gordon, “Rise and fall of American growth.”
x220 8y ago
>Should elementary schooldays be shortened by 25%? I don't recall a source, but I'm fairly sure that American school classes last longer than what data shows is effectual, i.e. teaching a class longer than X minutes (I think it's 30 or 40) has no demonstrable effect.
- kungtotte 8y ago
  This is anecdotal but we had a rather particular schedule when I was in our equivalent to high school. We had two classes/subjects per day. So the day was divided into a morning block of 2.5 hours, then lunch, and then an afternoon block of 2.5 hours. 20 minutes of break time was included inside each block, and we got some input in how to distribute those 20 minutes. Typically you'd do 2x10, or 1x20 with the 20 being either in the middle or at the end (go home earlier or longer lunch). I found it worked out great for all subjects. You could have a mini lecture first to learn something new, have a break, then have a bunch of time applying what you just learned. Or if we had lectures we had the lecture first then just as much time after for questions. You could watch a documentary and then have a follow-up discussion. We also didn't start classes until 9 AM, because the school knew that teenagers in general aren't at the top of their game in the morning. I really liked that setup.
ultraluminous 8y ago
What does any of that have to do with anything? I don't know if you've heard of the concept but working in shifts is a thing. It even allows employers to stagger their employees' schedules such that they can acheive a 24/7, without a single employee working 24h straight! The general labor force will work it out just fine and in some cases (such as elementary schools) will actually benefit greatly from re-evaluating their current work load. I still don't know why programmers think their profession is so fabulously unique that their office time scheduling can't even apply to any other industry.

by nhebb 8y ago

aqme28 8y ago

6 hour shifts fit into 24 hours just as well as 8 hour shifts do. You just need one more. And how long is elementary school? 8AM-3PM? If teachers weren't often required to do work outside of class, those hours sound pretty reasonable.

knodi123 8y ago

> Should elementary schooldays be shortened by 25%? Mine already did. Early dismissal at around 12:30 every friday. Thank goodness I have a stay-at-home mom for a wife, because I don't know how you're supposed to deal with that and also have a job. Actually I do know- they offer paid daycare on fridays. It's still a little silly.

dsnuh 8y ago
Same here. My kids have early dismissal every Wednesday. The winter and spring breaks are 4 weeks(!!!). They schedule "open house" type events which you are expected to attend monthly at 2:30pm on a Friday. I'm very lucky that I have support from family and an employer that is very accommodating to my schedule, as I am a divorced dad with a full time job.

augbog 8y ago

It looks like the link to the claim of shortening the work day is based on how schools for children aren't as long as the adult workday so I think your second question is already being applied right now. "In the LinkedIn post, Grant was weighing in on an Atlantic article about the time gap between when school and work days end, a bane for many parents. But it's not the first time Grant has given his stamp of approval to less work with more productivity."

nhebb 8y ago
Not really. In my area, the school day is 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Teachers typically arrive by 7:30 AM and leave around 3:30 PM - and then do grading and other work activities in their evenings. Where do you cut 25% from that? Who watches the kids - especially in some communities where single parent households are the norm? If the state provides daycare, the money has to come from somewhere, and school budgets are stretched as is. The workday reduction is a bit hand-wavy - it sounds good on the surface but when you get into the nitty gritty.
- Apocryphon 8y ago
  There’s already been an abundance of studies concluding that American school begins too early and kids aren’t sleeping enough. https://www.cdc.gov/features/school-start-times/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/features/school-start-times/index.html

gdubs 8y ago

Probably similar to the concerns people voiced when the 40hr week was proposed, but then it went on to actually increase productivity (largely attributed to an overall healthier, better rested, less accident prone workforce.) Source: R. Gordon, “Rise and fall of American growth.”

x220 8y ago

>Should elementary schooldays be shortened by 25%? I don't recall a source, but I'm fairly sure that American school classes last longer than what data shows is effectual, i.e. teaching a class longer than X minutes (I think it's 30 or 40) has no demonstrable effect.

kungtotte 8y ago
This is anecdotal but we had a rather particular schedule when I was in our equivalent to high school. We had two classes/subjects per day. So the day was divided into a morning block of 2.5 hours, then lunch, and then an afternoon block of 2.5 hours. 20 minutes of break time was included inside each block, and we got some input in how to distribute those 20 minutes. Typically you'd do 2x10, or 1x20 with the 20 being either in the middle or at the end (go home earlier or longer lunch). I found it worked out great for all subjects. You could have a mini lecture first to learn something new, have a break, then have a bunch of time applying what you just learned. Or if we had lectures we had the lecture first then just as much time after for questions. You could watch a documentary and then have a follow-up discussion. We also didn't start classes until 9 AM, because the school knew that teenagers in general aren't at the top of their game in the morning. I really liked that setup.

ultraluminous 8y ago

What does any of that have to do with anything? I don't know if you've heard of the concept but working in shifts is a thing. It even allows employers to stagger their employees' schedules such that they can acheive a 24/7, without a single employee working 24h straight! The general labor force will work it out just fine and in some cases (such as elementary schools) will actually benefit greatly from re-evaluating their current work load. I still don't know why programmers think their profession is so fabulously unique that their office time scheduling can't even apply to any other industry.