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I'm American but I've lived overseas for nearly a decade, and I hardly ever go back. In recent years when I meet other Americans who are visiting my city, I of

I'm American but I've lived overseas for nearly a decade, and I hardly ever go back. In recent years when I meet other Americans who are visiting my city, I often get this vague feeling that they're just trying too hard in one way or another. Maybe they're working too hard, or trying too hard to impress someone, or get attention, or assert themselves. I don't know if I've changed or if America is changed or if it's something else entirely. What I do wonder is, what's with all these Americans working themselves to the bone? I own an agency which is one of the types of businesses called out in this article. I tell all my employees very clearly, whenever possible, work 40 hours and then call it a week. We also happen to be mostly remote so I tell them, within reason, respecting a small number of important calls/meeting times etc. you can put in those hours whenever you want, preferably after a great night's sleep. There's nothing like "you're measured by how many hours you bill out," nor does there need to be, if we have more than 40 hours of work per person per week, we hire more people. Where does this all come from? This is an honest question. Why are people working themselves to death in the US and having this crazy mindset that doing stuff which puts you on the verge of a breakdown is good? When did this start? Is it good for health/happiness? Definitely not Is it good for productivity? Maybe, but I doubt it

djpr 8y ago
I'm curious, where do you work now and who are your clients? I worked in Asia and the work culture with the Chinese (mainlanders) and those of Chinese-descent (Chinese Malaysians, Chinese Singaporean) was more challenging than working with Americans. When I was in advertising, stories of people working and staying (as in sleeping over) during the weekends was not uncommon. Clients would call me at 11pm asking for a concall with my staff. 12 hours a day for weeks on end, including working weekends, were common place. We were able to hire great talent just by promising that we'd never ask our staff to work weekends and hardly ever after 7pm on a workday. We had mostly US clients so that was an easy thing for us to day. This culture shifted a bit when stories of young agency people in Hong Kong and other Asian cities dying from exhaustion became a big deal 4-5 years ago. But its still very workaholic culture. Don't get me wrong, Americans work insane hours compared to Indonesians or the French, but parts of Asia is a whole other level of madness.
- apatters 8y ago
  I'm in Thailand and our customers are almost all in the US. Some Thai companies have a pretty grueling culture, six days a week, little/no vacation, etc. Our customers don't try to micromanage as long as we're getting results. I think our approach to work just comes down to me setting the tone. I was very lucky to have a teacher all the way back in elementary school who drilled the "Work smarter, not harder" mentality into my head from an early age. And I've maintained 100% ownership of my company, therefore I exert the main influence over the culture. The way we do things works so I have no desire to change it.
  - ghostbrainalpha 8y ago
    They are lucky to have you, but how does "work smarter, not harder" work for competitors who aren't as smart as you? If you can't compete with others at school, in the workplace, or as a business based on intellectual superiority the gap has to be made up somewhere. Usually that leads to hard work and then a vicious cycle.
    - apatters 8y ago
      That's an interesting question. I'm not sure this is a satisfactory answer, but I think what we do isn't really enabled by superior intellect as much as it is by a focus on good process and introspection. In other words it comes down to good management -- this is just my pet theory, but as a ruminating introvert, when I did live and work in the US I felt that I witnessed a lot of extroverts get promoted into positions of authority because they were popular, and proceed to make poor decisions.
    - Nasrudith 8y ago
      The point of that statement is usually doing the efficient thing instead of just working hard because the end results are what really matter. Why use a brush for broad areas when a paint roller can get the job done quicker?
  - coupdejarnac 8y ago
    I didn't know it was possible to have a 100% foreign owned business in Thailand. Is that a new development, or is the business in your SO's name?
HaHa31 8y ago
The historical component for this work ethic is frequently tied to Protestantism, especially Puritanism. Work was divinely mandated, and shirking that responsibility was socially unacceptable. Work was also more necessary, as not working hard enough could led to the death of your community. Just my two cents
blitmap 8y ago
Anecdotal: 1) Working 40 hours a week does not support my long-term goals (house fund, retirement, vacations, etc). Which is another way of saying my job doesn't pay enough. 2) Companies will gladly have someone perform the work of 3 people and replace them when they burn out. It is rarely in the budget to increase staff with additional work (hah).
- HeyLaughingBoy 8y ago
  Equally anecdotal: when I found myself in this position 20 years ago, my response was to move to a lower COL part of the country that still had plenty of tech jobs (Upper Midwest). I only wish I had done it even sooner!
  - walshemj 8y ago
    Advertising/publishing isn't tech pay is a lot worse
rabidrat 8y ago
I think we're all increasingly aware that our society and infrastructure are crumbling, and no matter how "rich" the country as a whole is, if you haven't built up your own security through wealth, you're [going to be] fucked. And that awareness translates into people being willing to overwork themselves, so they don't lose their spot in the rat race; and corporations with money to spend on workers are well-positioned to take advantage of that, and they do.
- PavlovsCat 8y ago
  That's tragic, since the "rat race" is kind of the reason why society and infrastructure are crumbling.
  - robertfw 8y ago
    I think the rat race is a symptom, not a cause
    - PavlovsCat 8y ago
      What would you say is the cause?
      - marnett 8y ago
        Many would say globalized, unfettered capitalism.
- phillc73 8y ago
  > if you haven't built up your own security through wealth, you're [going to be] fucked. Another approach is to build security through self sufficiency and community based initiatives. For example, growing your own food wherever possible, or community gardens on common land. There is a long list of examples and ideas where future security, defining that as decent quality of life, health and education, doesn't need to be based around monetary wealth.
  - deleted 8y ago
jt2190 8y ago
I suspect your data set is skewed toward those with higher disposable incomes who can travel abroad versus those who are content to live more modestly.
- apatters 8y ago
  Excellent point
jbob2000 8y ago
The US (and by greater extent, the western world) praises individualism - “do it yourself or it won’t get done right” is a common theme. I think this is a driving force behind overwork.
- criddell 8y ago
  I think it might be more like "do it yourself or it won't get done". It wasn't that long ago when agriculture was a very big employer. I have a lot of farmers in my family and basically, if the sun is up, they are working. When something needs to be done, they DIY-it mostly because that's all they can afford.
ryandrake 8y ago
> What I do wonder is, what's with all these Americans working themselves to the bone? Intense competition among labor and companies’ willingness and ability to squeeze value out of employees. Life is not getting any cheaper, but there is a perpetually larger and larger supply of labor willing to do your job for less. Employers are very efficient at capturing that value, so if you want to keep your job from someone willing to be paid N% less, you need to be N% more productive. The most visible proxy for doing that is to work longer hours. Or, be willing to work for less and work multiple jobs. Lots of people do that too.
esotericn 8y ago
I don't see this as being unique to the US. It's pretty similar in London (UK), for example. Here, it's about the fact that most people are hilariously, almost comically underpaid. The cheapest 1 bedroom flat I can find within an hour of the centre is going to be in the ballpark of 200K. So if you don't have established wealth, or earn at least 50K (4x mortgage), you're a prole. Unsurprisingly, people don't want to be proles, so they work their bollocks off to get out of that category.
- guitarbill 8y ago
  London is a special kind of hell. Of course, you can have a meaningful and fulfilled life outside of London, but maybe unsurprisingly for a city built on finance (in the modern area?), it attracts people who can only think of money, not cost. Or, for those less driven, maybe moving to London is the equivalent of going to uni, you do it because everybody else is and you don't have a better plan. IDK, I didn't get it and still don't. For Americans, I imagine NYC or LA is similar. The traffic alone would keep me out of LA.
  - neuromantik8086 8y ago
    It's a bit different in the U.S. in the sense that, whereas in Britain and France most mid-sized cities have decent public transit and municipal services, in the U.S. only a handful large urban centers have these kinds of things. For example, in Clermont-Ferrand, which is roughly to Paris what Albany is in NYC, there is a well-established tram system that can get you to many places you'd want to go to without a car. This is especially essential if you're low income. Albany in contrast, just has buses (the CDTA), and pretty crap buses at that. The only other city in New York State with anything even remotely approaching the utility of the subway system is the light rail system in Buffalo, which is mostly useless since it only comprises one marginally useful line. Believe me, as someone not involved in finance in NYC, if I could get the same services I get here in a mid-sized city like Pittsburgh, Cincinnati or Buffalo, I'd strongly consider relocation.
    - esotericn 8y ago
johnchristopher 8y ago
> Where does this all come from? This is an honest question. Why are people working themselves to death in the US and having this crazy mindset that doing stuff which puts you on the verge of a breakdown is good? When did this start? I believe it all started when the Church of Pavlina opened and easy access to personal development blog fueled by Ferris and others. The ubermensch was promoted. At the same time Amazon and Facebook showed that you could make it big or be a slave so.. fear of doom and american success stories à la "you too can do it if you want" ?
- yitianjian 8y ago
  Hey - I've never really heard about the "Church of Pavlina", and Google isn't really forthcoming. Do you mind explaining what you mean a bit?
  - HeyLaughingBoy 8y ago
    Steve Pavlina is/was a programmer turned motivational(?) speaker.
  - johnchristopher 8y ago
    Sure (sorry about being cryptic). Steve Pavlina is one of the first superstar of the online self-help world (dating back to 2004 or 2006). It started with an article on a famous website for programmers (can't remember the name atm) about how he dig really deep with his first game and so others were playing catching up but he was raking in a steady monthly income (see where we are going and who would be interested ?). Then he started his personnal weblog (yeah, we used to call'em weblog in my days) about self help and how he experimented with polyphasic sleep (sleeping 3 or 4 hours a days in twenty minutes increment, see the kind of folks that would bite that bait ?). So far, so good. Then he went full crazy with psychic powers like talking to bird, being a telepath, reality shaping (aka the secret), etc. His article were 10 or 12 A4 pages long (wonder how that goes nowadays) and it was kind of mesmerizing to see all that happening in real time (I admit I got first intrigued with his time management article and I kept reading for the crazy). There was a funny experiment with polyamory and it ended with a divorce. See http://edificial.blogspot.com/2006/08/church-of-steve-pavlina.html http://edificial.blogspot.com/2006/08/church-of-steve-pavlin... for the church of pavlina and https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Steve_Pavlina https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Steve_Pavlina for links and stuff. Of course they guy was kinda successful (financially).
PavlovsCat 8y ago
When meaning and agency get steadily stripped away, or are even thrown away gladly, until all that remains are metrics that pretend to fill the hole but never really do, the hamster wheel efficiency goes up by a gazillion percent. A phrase by John Cleese in another context comes to mind: "operating at a very, very low level of mental health." Most people would find that offensive if they heard it head on, but then complain they're not happy in the same breath. But it should be considered an opportunity, "unhealthy" can also be another word for "a lot of untapped potential". http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/fromm_erich_t.html http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/from... > For instance, what would you say is happening to man, American man, in relationship to his work? > FROMM: I think his work is to a large extent, meaningless, because he is not related to it. He is increasingly part of a big machinery, social machinery, governed by a big bureaucracy......and I think American man unconsciously hates his work very often, because he feels trapped by it...imprisoned by it... because he feels that he is spending most of his energy for something which has no meaning in itself. I would say people don't really breed well in captivity, and that's it. Even people who consciously want it, who are so broken they embrace captivity, are not exempt. They die in some way or other, sooner or later, in one generation or another, sometimes by creating the catastrophe that kills them. Maybe the additional "complexity" is really just invented by a.) prison wards and b.) prisoners who don't dare to meet their gaze, for obvious reasons in either case. > There is a goal, but no way; but what we call a way is hesitation. -- Franz Kafka We have too many yes, but's. They kill the soul, and then the body leads a derpy life.
- petra 8y ago
  >> I think his work is to a large extent, meaningless, So create your own meaning. tell your own story. What's wrong with "i take in a job that feed me and my coworkers" for meaning ? As for autonomy - that's different.
  - PavlovsCat 8y ago
    > As for autonomy - that's different. Different as in separate from meaning? I disagree.
egypturnash 8y ago
It comes from the long-running anti-union propaganda campaigns put on by corporations. It comes from deregulation, which comes from politicians wholly bought and paid for by corporations. It comes from years of flat minimum wage alongside constant inflation. It comes from years and years of decisions about what a business can do to a worker that almost all come down in favor of infinite rights for the business and none for the worker, because the businesses are the ones who can hire the fancy lawyers to spin tangled webs of justifications resting on previous bad decisions or willful misreadings of the letter of existing law. I am sitting in a hotel bed as I write this, killing time before leaving to catch a plane home. Yesterday I extended my stay by a day; I noticed the front desk clerk was wearing a union button, and complimented him on it. When he mentioned their contract is up for re-negotiation at the end of the month, I wished the union the best of luck in getting a fair chunk of the profits they’re making for the owners. It felt great to be able to say things like that.
- kazen44 8y ago
  the fact that unions/left wing politics have very little political representation in the US is also fairly astounding. How is it possible that a political ideology which should appeal to the bottom 50% of the workforce has no representation?
TACIXAT 8y ago
Some people enjoy doing more. I work at work, then I work at home on side projects. This does not have to mean I am dying from overwork. It is the same for exercise, am I trying to impress people or get attention? I don't think so, I'm pretty sure I just like doing pull ups. By all means, do what makes you happy, if you want to check out after 40 hours, that is fine. However, don't project your attitude to work on other people. It can be perfectly healthy and enjoyable to work your ass off.
munificent 8y ago
> What I do wonder is, what's with all these Americans working themselves to the bone? It's what happens when economic inequality increases continuously for decades. The slope of the line between the haves and the have-nots gets steeper and slipperier every year. Every year, the bottom end of that line gets ever more grim. When there are fewer jobs to go around, fewer safety nets for people who can't find jobs, and being unemployed means losing health insurance and possibly dying, yeah, people are gonna hustle. It's awful.
wnevets 8y ago
>Where does this all come from? This is an honest question. Why are people working themselves to death in the US and having this crazy mindset that doing stuff which puts you on the verge of a breakdown is good? When did this start? Americans have been convinced (largely by republicans) that the reason so many americans are struggling financially is because they're lazy and stupid. One of the side effects of this is people being proud of working non stop as proof that they're not lazy and stupid like everyone else.
- BonesJustice 8y ago
  Consequently, any time someone proposes something that will improve the lives of every working American, a disturbing number of us respond along the lines of, "Hey, I work my ass off, and I've had to suffer over ____, so everyone else should have to suffer at least as much." As opposed to, say, "Hey, I've had to deal with ____, and it sucks. Let's fix it so none of us have to deal with this anymore."
- JustSomeNobody 8y ago
  Oh! I see you've been listening to Mitch McConnell! Yeah, that man HATES the poor and lower middle class.
draw_down 8y ago
I don't know, I don't get it either. I think things are just becoming more desperate generally. Americans don't know what to do except work harder, maybe. Personally I've always wanted to figure out ways to make more while doing less; it's obvious in our economy that what you make and how much you work are disconnected at best. Most of them are probably just burning themselves out for basically nothing.
JustSomeNobody 8y ago
MBA's are trained to wring every ounce of productivity from employees by working them more than 40 hours (because working late is a badge of honor!) while letting them know that, yet again, there are no raises coming and they need to take one for the team and we all need to tighten our belts and blah blah. And yet, American workers still hold fast to the dream that if they just work harder, they'll be more successful. That dream doesn't exist. The nightmare that does is that workers are continuing to work for less and less each year.
amelius 8y ago
Passion, or workaholism? Or perhaps it's because a single income isn't sufficient anymore to support a household, and people without a partner still need to pay rent/mortgage.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
wpietri 8y ago
A historian I'm fond of, Walter McDougall, is writing a trilogy of American history books where a key theme is how the notion of "hustle" is central to what America is. For him, though, the word's dual American meanings of "work hard/move quickly" and "mislead/scam" are closely joined. I think he's right. So many of these companies that value hustle are up to something ethically suspect. But if you go fast enough and apply enough pressure, nobody really has time to stop and say, "Wait, are we doing the right thing here?" So although it'd definitely bad for worker health and generally also harms productivity, I think it's great for the profitability of whoever's at the top. And also for sweeping any ethical questions under the rug until after their pockets are filled.
kromem 8y ago
Here's the secret: it's total BS. "Hustle" is almost always BS. And real hustle is a red flag. If people can't get what needs to get done within predefined work hours, it's either a reflection of incompetency or poor time management. I worked at one of the ad holding companies mentioned for a few years, and the magic behind the curtain is that there's no magic behind the curtain. Agencies by and large blow smoke up the clients' behinds as a matter of standard practice. And the clients typically know this (though I'm not sure they know the full extent of it), but put up with it because the work they are engaging an agency for makes more sense to outsource to the agencies, and since all agencies are posturing, they simply pick who they think BS'ed best (as if that's a reflection of what will actually get done). When I was there, it was all about BSing digital competency and foresight. Everyone was trying to claim a better finger on the pulse of change. Now that change has somewhat slowed down (no major hardware upsets in the past few or next few years), it makes sense to start behaving more like a commoditized service and trying to brand oneself as offering greater efficiency than one's counterparts. Which is why if I was still in the industry today, my pitch deck would probably include a slide about how you won't hear us talking about "hustle" because it should only be necessary if you're not optimizing your work day (and including out of country examples of functioning companies working even less than standard hours and doing great work, and numbers about productivity tanking as hours go up). "So you could pick a 'hustle' agency, but are they spending their 'productive' hours on you, or are they billing you for those extra hours operating at lower efficiency? If you see an agency claiming to 'hustle', personally we'd suggest hustling in the other direction ASAP."
Nasrudith 8y ago
I think insecurity is a driver for it. Fear that if they work just 40 hours they'll get replaced with somebody working 50. Not to mention some cases of sociopathic "sacrifice mentality" where they think if they aren't extracting as much as possible they are leaving money on the table even when both productivity and cost are the opposite with turnover. People living paycheck to paycheck excaberates it.
analog31 8y ago
Americans live with the awareness of two issues. First, we are one crisis away from poverty unless we can build up our own safety net in the form of wealth. Second, the most successful people tend to have grown up in households where they could count on a family safety net. The mere presence of wealth is beneficial to our children by letting them take more risks. This drives people who are not independently wealthy, to try and build that wealth in excess of what they might actually need for survival, and even for a happy life. Is it good for productivity? I measure my productivity in terms of what I produce for my family.
helij 8y ago
Sounds like a great place to work. Are you hiring? :)
badpun 8y ago
Maybe it's the Internet? It's filled with success porn (exceptional people giving talks, streaming while they work etc.), as well as ordinary people giving each other pep talks (for example, gamedev subreddit is full of people telling you should be making games in addition to your full time job).

djpr 8y ago

I'm curious, where do you work now and who are your clients? I worked in Asia and the work culture with the Chinese (mainlanders) and those of Chinese-descent (Chinese Malaysians, Chinese Singaporean) was more challenging than working with Americans. When I was in advertising, stories of people working and staying (as in sleeping over) during the weekends was not uncommon. Clients would call me at 11pm asking for a concall with my staff. 12 hours a day for weeks on end, including working weekends, were common place. We were able to hire great talent just by promising that we'd never ask our staff to work weekends and hardly ever after 7pm on a workday. We had mostly US clients so that was an easy thing for us to day. This culture shifted a bit when stories of young agency people in Hong Kong and other Asian cities dying from exhaustion became a big deal 4-5 years ago. But its still very workaholic culture. Don't get me wrong, Americans work insane hours compared to Indonesians or the French, but parts of Asia is a whole other level of madness.

apatters 8y ago
I'm in Thailand and our customers are almost all in the US. Some Thai companies have a pretty grueling culture, six days a week, little/no vacation, etc. Our customers don't try to micromanage as long as we're getting results. I think our approach to work just comes down to me setting the tone. I was very lucky to have a teacher all the way back in elementary school who drilled the "Work smarter, not harder" mentality into my head from an early age. And I've maintained 100% ownership of my company, therefore I exert the main influence over the culture. The way we do things works so I have no desire to change it.
- ghostbrainalpha 8y ago
  They are lucky to have you, but how does "work smarter, not harder" work for competitors who aren't as smart as you? If you can't compete with others at school, in the workplace, or as a business based on intellectual superiority the gap has to be made up somewhere. Usually that leads to hard work and then a vicious cycle.
  - apatters 8y ago
    That's an interesting question. I'm not sure this is a satisfactory answer, but I think what we do isn't really enabled by superior intellect as much as it is by a focus on good process and introspection. In other words it comes down to good management -- this is just my pet theory, but as a ruminating introvert, when I did live and work in the US I felt that I witnessed a lot of extroverts get promoted into positions of authority because they were popular, and proceed to make poor decisions.
  - Nasrudith 8y ago
    The point of that statement is usually doing the efficient thing instead of just working hard because the end results are what really matter. Why use a brush for broad areas when a paint roller can get the job done quicker?
- coupdejarnac 8y ago
  I didn't know it was possible to have a 100% foreign owned business in Thailand. Is that a new development, or is the business in your SO's name?

HaHa31 8y ago

The historical component for this work ethic is frequently tied to Protestantism, especially Puritanism. Work was divinely mandated, and shirking that responsibility was socially unacceptable. Work was also more necessary, as not working hard enough could led to the death of your community. Just my two cents

blitmap 8y ago

Anecdotal: 1) Working 40 hours a week does not support my long-term goals (house fund, retirement, vacations, etc). Which is another way of saying my job doesn't pay enough. 2) Companies will gladly have someone perform the work of 3 people and replace them when they burn out. It is rarely in the budget to increase staff with additional work (hah).

HeyLaughingBoy 8y ago
Equally anecdotal: when I found myself in this position 20 years ago, my response was to move to a lower COL part of the country that still had plenty of tech jobs (Upper Midwest). I only wish I had done it even sooner!
- walshemj 8y ago
  Advertising/publishing isn't tech pay is a lot worse

rabidrat 8y ago

I think we're all increasingly aware that our society and infrastructure are crumbling, and no matter how "rich" the country as a whole is, if you haven't built up your own security through wealth, you're [going to be] fucked. And that awareness translates into people being willing to overwork themselves, so they don't lose their spot in the rat race; and corporations with money to spend on workers are well-positioned to take advantage of that, and they do.

PavlovsCat 8y ago
That's tragic, since the "rat race" is kind of the reason why society and infrastructure are crumbling.
- robertfw 8y ago
  I think the rat race is a symptom, not a cause
  - PavlovsCat 8y ago
    What would you say is the cause?
    - marnett 8y ago
      Many would say globalized, unfettered capitalism.
phillc73 8y ago
> if you haven't built up your own security through wealth, you're [going to be] fucked. Another approach is to build security through self sufficiency and community based initiatives. For example, growing your own food wherever possible, or community gardens on common land. There is a long list of examples and ideas where future security, defining that as decent quality of life, health and education, doesn't need to be based around monetary wealth.
- deleted 8y ago

jt2190 8y ago

I suspect your data set is skewed toward those with higher disposable incomes who can travel abroad versus those who are content to live more modestly.

apatters 8y ago
Excellent point

jbob2000 8y ago

The US (and by greater extent, the western world) praises individualism - “do it yourself or it won’t get done right” is a common theme. I think this is a driving force behind overwork.

criddell 8y ago
I think it might be more like "do it yourself or it won't get done". It wasn't that long ago when agriculture was a very big employer. I have a lot of farmers in my family and basically, if the sun is up, they are working. When something needs to be done, they DIY-it mostly because that's all they can afford.

ryandrake 8y ago

> What I do wonder is, what's with all these Americans working themselves to the bone? Intense competition among labor and companies’ willingness and ability to squeeze value out of employees. Life is not getting any cheaper, but there is a perpetually larger and larger supply of labor willing to do your job for less. Employers are very efficient at capturing that value, so if you want to keep your job from someone willing to be paid N% less, you need to be N% more productive. The most visible proxy for doing that is to work longer hours. Or, be willing to work for less and work multiple jobs. Lots of people do that too.

esotericn 8y ago

I don't see this as being unique to the US. It's pretty similar in London (UK), for example. Here, it's about the fact that most people are hilariously, almost comically underpaid. The cheapest 1 bedroom flat I can find within an hour of the centre is going to be in the ballpark of 200K. So if you don't have established wealth, or earn at least 50K (4x mortgage), you're a prole. Unsurprisingly, people don't want to be proles, so they work their bollocks off to get out of that category.

guitarbill 8y ago
London is a special kind of hell. Of course, you can have a meaningful and fulfilled life outside of London, but maybe unsurprisingly for a city built on finance (in the modern area?), it attracts people who can only think of money, not cost. Or, for those less driven, maybe moving to London is the equivalent of going to uni, you do it because everybody else is and you don't have a better plan. IDK, I didn't get it and still don't. For Americans, I imagine NYC or LA is similar. The traffic alone would keep me out of LA.
- neuromantik8086 8y ago
  It's a bit different in the U.S. in the sense that, whereas in Britain and France most mid-sized cities have decent public transit and municipal services, in the U.S. only a handful large urban centers have these kinds of things. For example, in Clermont-Ferrand, which is roughly to Paris what Albany is in NYC, there is a well-established tram system that can get you to many places you'd want to go to without a car. This is especially essential if you're low income. Albany in contrast, just has buses (the CDTA), and pretty crap buses at that. The only other city in New York State with anything even remotely approaching the utility of the subway system is the light rail system in Buffalo, which is mostly useless since it only comprises one marginally useful line. Believe me, as someone not involved in finance in NYC, if I could get the same services I get here in a mid-sized city like Pittsburgh, Cincinnati or Buffalo, I'd strongly consider relocation.
  - esotericn 8y ago

johnchristopher 8y ago

> Where does this all come from? This is an honest question. Why are people working themselves to death in the US and having this crazy mindset that doing stuff which puts you on the verge of a breakdown is good? When did this start? I believe it all started when the Church of Pavlina opened and easy access to personal development blog fueled by Ferris and others. The ubermensch was promoted. At the same time Amazon and Facebook showed that you could make it big or be a slave so.. fear of doom and american success stories à la "you too can do it if you want" ?

yitianjian 8y ago
Hey - I've never really heard about the "Church of Pavlina", and Google isn't really forthcoming. Do you mind explaining what you mean a bit?
- HeyLaughingBoy 8y ago
  Steve Pavlina is/was a programmer turned motivational(?) speaker.
- johnchristopher 8y ago
  Sure (sorry about being cryptic). Steve Pavlina is one of the first superstar of the online self-help world (dating back to 2004 or 2006). It started with an article on a famous website for programmers (can't remember the name atm) about how he dig really deep with his first game and so others were playing catching up but he was raking in a steady monthly income (see where we are going and who would be interested ?). Then he started his personnal weblog (yeah, we used to call'em weblog in my days) about self help and how he experimented with polyphasic sleep (sleeping 3 or 4 hours a days in twenty minutes increment, see the kind of folks that would bite that bait ?). So far, so good. Then he went full crazy with psychic powers like talking to bird, being a telepath, reality shaping (aka the secret), etc. His article were 10 or 12 A4 pages long (wonder how that goes nowadays) and it was kind of mesmerizing to see all that happening in real time (I admit I got first intrigued with his time management article and I kept reading for the crazy). There was a funny experiment with polyamory and it ended with a divorce. See http://edificial.blogspot.com/2006/08/church-of-steve-pavlina.html http://edificial.blogspot.com/2006/08/church-of-steve-pavlin... for the church of pavlina and https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Steve_Pavlina https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Steve_Pavlina for links and stuff. Of course they guy was kinda successful (financially).

PavlovsCat 8y ago

When meaning and agency get steadily stripped away, or are even thrown away gladly, until all that remains are metrics that pretend to fill the hole but never really do, the hamster wheel efficiency goes up by a gazillion percent. A phrase by John Cleese in another context comes to mind: "operating at a very, very low level of mental health." Most people would find that offensive if they heard it head on, but then complain they're not happy in the same breath. But it should be considered an opportunity, "unhealthy" can also be another word for "a lot of untapped potential". http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/fromm_erich_t.html http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/from... > For instance, what would you say is happening to man, American man, in relationship to his work? > FROMM: I think his work is to a large extent, meaningless, because he is not related to it. He is increasingly part of a big machinery, social machinery, governed by a big bureaucracy......and I think American man unconsciously hates his work very often, because he feels trapped by it...imprisoned by it... because he feels that he is spending most of his energy for something which has no meaning in itself. I would say people don't really breed well in captivity, and that's it. Even people who consciously want it, who are so broken they embrace captivity, are not exempt. They die in some way or other, sooner or later, in one generation or another, sometimes by creating the catastrophe that kills them. Maybe the additional "complexity" is really just invented by a.) prison wards and b.) prisoners who don't dare to meet their gaze, for obvious reasons in either case. > There is a goal, but no way; but what we call a way is hesitation. -- Franz Kafka We have too many yes, but's. They kill the soul, and then the body leads a derpy life.

petra 8y ago
>> I think his work is to a large extent, meaningless, So create your own meaning. tell your own story. What's wrong with "i take in a job that feed me and my coworkers" for meaning ? As for autonomy - that's different.
- PavlovsCat 8y ago
  > As for autonomy - that's different. Different as in separate from meaning? I disagree.

egypturnash 8y ago

It comes from the long-running anti-union propaganda campaigns put on by corporations. It comes from deregulation, which comes from politicians wholly bought and paid for by corporations. It comes from years of flat minimum wage alongside constant inflation. It comes from years and years of decisions about what a business can do to a worker that almost all come down in favor of infinite rights for the business and none for the worker, because the businesses are the ones who can hire the fancy lawyers to spin tangled webs of justifications resting on previous bad decisions or willful misreadings of the letter of existing law. I am sitting in a hotel bed as I write this, killing time before leaving to catch a plane home. Yesterday I extended my stay by a day; I noticed the front desk clerk was wearing a union button, and complimented him on it. When he mentioned their contract is up for re-negotiation at the end of the month, I wished the union the best of luck in getting a fair chunk of the profits they’re making for the owners. It felt great to be able to say things like that.

kazen44 8y ago
the fact that unions/left wing politics have very little political representation in the US is also fairly astounding. How is it possible that a political ideology which should appeal to the bottom 50% of the workforce has no representation?

TACIXAT 8y ago

Some people enjoy doing more. I work at work, then I work at home on side projects. This does not have to mean I am dying from overwork. It is the same for exercise, am I trying to impress people or get attention? I don't think so, I'm pretty sure I just like doing pull ups. By all means, do what makes you happy, if you want to check out after 40 hours, that is fine. However, don't project your attitude to work on other people. It can be perfectly healthy and enjoyable to work your ass off.

munificent 8y ago

> What I do wonder is, what's with all these Americans working themselves to the bone? It's what happens when economic inequality increases continuously for decades. The slope of the line between the haves and the have-nots gets steeper and slipperier every year. Every year, the bottom end of that line gets ever more grim. When there are fewer jobs to go around, fewer safety nets for people who can't find jobs, and being unemployed means losing health insurance and possibly dying, yeah, people are gonna hustle. It's awful.

wnevets 8y ago

>Where does this all come from? This is an honest question. Why are people working themselves to death in the US and having this crazy mindset that doing stuff which puts you on the verge of a breakdown is good? When did this start? Americans have been convinced (largely by republicans) that the reason so many americans are struggling financially is because they're lazy and stupid. One of the side effects of this is people being proud of working non stop as proof that they're not lazy and stupid like everyone else.

BonesJustice 8y ago
Consequently, any time someone proposes something that will improve the lives of every working American, a disturbing number of us respond along the lines of, "Hey, I work my ass off, and I've had to suffer over ____, so everyone else should have to suffer at least as much." As opposed to, say, "Hey, I've had to deal with ____, and it sucks. Let's fix it so none of us have to deal with this anymore."
JustSomeNobody 8y ago
Oh! I see you've been listening to Mitch McConnell! Yeah, that man HATES the poor and lower middle class.

draw_down 8y ago

I don't know, I don't get it either. I think things are just becoming more desperate generally. Americans don't know what to do except work harder, maybe. Personally I've always wanted to figure out ways to make more while doing less; it's obvious in our economy that what you make and how much you work are disconnected at best. Most of them are probably just burning themselves out for basically nothing.

JustSomeNobody 8y ago

MBA's are trained to wring every ounce of productivity from employees by working them more than 40 hours (because working late is a badge of honor!) while letting them know that, yet again, there are no raises coming and they need to take one for the team and we all need to tighten our belts and blah blah. And yet, American workers still hold fast to the dream that if they just work harder, they'll be more successful. That dream doesn't exist. The nightmare that does is that workers are continuing to work for less and less each year.

amelius 8y ago

Passion, or workaholism? Or perhaps it's because a single income isn't sufficient anymore to support a household, and people without a partner still need to pay rent/mortgage.

deleted 8y ago

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wpietri 8y ago

A historian I'm fond of, Walter McDougall, is writing a trilogy of American history books where a key theme is how the notion of "hustle" is central to what America is. For him, though, the word's dual American meanings of "work hard/move quickly" and "mislead/scam" are closely joined. I think he's right. So many of these companies that value hustle are up to something ethically suspect. But if you go fast enough and apply enough pressure, nobody really has time to stop and say, "Wait, are we doing the right thing here?" So although it'd definitely bad for worker health and generally also harms productivity, I think it's great for the profitability of whoever's at the top. And also for sweeping any ethical questions under the rug until after their pockets are filled.

kromem 8y ago

Here's the secret: it's total BS. "Hustle" is almost always BS. And real hustle is a red flag. If people can't get what needs to get done within predefined work hours, it's either a reflection of incompetency or poor time management. I worked at one of the ad holding companies mentioned for a few years, and the magic behind the curtain is that there's no magic behind the curtain. Agencies by and large blow smoke up the clients' behinds as a matter of standard practice. And the clients typically know this (though I'm not sure they know the full extent of it), but put up with it because the work they are engaging an agency for makes more sense to outsource to the agencies, and since all agencies are posturing, they simply pick who they think BS'ed best (as if that's a reflection of what will actually get done). When I was there, it was all about BSing digital competency and foresight. Everyone was trying to claim a better finger on the pulse of change. Now that change has somewhat slowed down (no major hardware upsets in the past few or next few years), it makes sense to start behaving more like a commoditized service and trying to brand oneself as offering greater efficiency than one's counterparts. Which is why if I was still in the industry today, my pitch deck would probably include a slide about how you won't hear us talking about "hustle" because it should only be necessary if you're not optimizing your work day (and including out of country examples of functioning companies working even less than standard hours and doing great work, and numbers about productivity tanking as hours go up). "So you could pick a 'hustle' agency, but are they spending their 'productive' hours on you, or are they billing you for those extra hours operating at lower efficiency? If you see an agency claiming to 'hustle', personally we'd suggest hustling in the other direction ASAP."

Nasrudith 8y ago

I think insecurity is a driver for it. Fear that if they work just 40 hours they'll get replaced with somebody working 50. Not to mention some cases of sociopathic "sacrifice mentality" where they think if they aren't extracting as much as possible they are leaving money on the table even when both productivity and cost are the opposite with turnover. People living paycheck to paycheck excaberates it.

analog31 8y ago

Americans live with the awareness of two issues. First, we are one crisis away from poverty unless we can build up our own safety net in the form of wealth. Second, the most successful people tend to have grown up in households where they could count on a family safety net. The mere presence of wealth is beneficial to our children by letting them take more risks. This drives people who are not independently wealthy, to try and build that wealth in excess of what they might actually need for survival, and even for a happy life. Is it good for productivity? I measure my productivity in terms of what I produce for my family.

helij 8y ago

Sounds like a great place to work. Are you hiring? :)

badpun 8y ago

Maybe it's the Internet? It's filled with success porn (exceptional people giving talks, streaming while they work etc.), as well as ordinary people giving each other pep talks (for example, gamedev subreddit is full of people telling you should be making games in addition to your full time job).