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The author's analysis is so entirely subjective as to what constitutes "work" as to be meaningless. I certainly believe that most creative workers cannot spen

The author's analysis is so entirely subjective as to what constitutes "work" as to be meaningless. I certainly believe that most creative workers cannot spend 8 hours a day being creatively productive, although even there the variation is enormous. I used to observe a factor of 5 or more difference in productivity between the most productive and least productive of my engineering team, and a lot of that was due to the ability of some to stay focused and fully absorbed in creation for hour after hour, whereas the average engineer simply stopped producing much after a couple of hours. Interestingly, a lot of this was attention span limited. Take the person who was good for 2 hours of productive coding on a product, and give them two significantly separate areas of responsibility, and their productivity would close to double, as they could pull off a mid-day switch and be fully energized for a second shift at the creative keyboard. But just because you're not doing the highest value / highest drain portion of your job constantly, doesn't mean you're not working. Good managers know to balance workload and expectations. And as others have noted, this varies enormously from one profession to the next. The nurses in the hospital where I worked as CTO worked 12 hour shifts, and nobody in their right mind would make the argument that they weren't working the entire time. Most worked three 12 hours shifts per week, so they had a short work week, but the doctors they worked with routinely worked 12 hrs/day, often 5 days per week, and then spent part of their 2 "off" days working as well. My daughter-in-law, who teaches elementary school, has no "own time" between 8:00 AM and 4:00PM, other than a half hour break when her students are at lunch, and then works a couple of hours most evenings in addition. It's a rare week during the school year when she doesn't have 45 hours per week in which she is completely "owned" be the job - which is to say, working.

dpark 5y ago
> the doctors they worked with routinely worked 12 hrs/day, often 5 days per week, and then spent part of their 2 "off" days working as well. I have a lot of trouble believing this. You’re claiming that 60 hours minimum was standard for doctors yet somehow the nurses had enough sway to get away with 36 hours. Ignoring how much of that as “active work”, I have trouble believing they are even in the facility for that many hours. Maybe residents, because they do get worked to death, but post residency I can’t imagine you could keep doctors while working them like this. > My daughter-in-law, who teaches elementary school, has no "own time" between 8:00 AM and 4:00PM, other than a half hour break when her students are at lunch, and then works a couple of hours most evenings I think you missed part of the article. Much of a teacher’s day is not hard mental work. Especially for established teachers who have done the work to build lesson plans already.
- walnutclosefarm 5y ago
  Nurses are hourly employees and their employment terms are strongly influenced by the fact that many of the nurses in the employment area were unionized. The fact that they are hourly means there is a compelling financial incentive to limit their work time to 40 hours per week or less. The prevalence of unionized nurses in the market means that even non-union hospitals had to approximate the terms of the unionized ones, or they'd have unmanageable turnover, if they could even maintain staffing (nurses are in many markets scarce relative to demand). It was an academic medical center, so roughly 1/4 to 1/3 of the staff were residents or fellows. Most of the rest had joint appointments in the clinic or hospital and the medical school and research arm. I know their hours because they largely mimicked my hours. Most started by 6:30AM, and 7:00 at the latest. I often chatted with them in the parking garage 11 or 12 hours later. And not that I said they "routinely worked 12 hour days" not that they did it every day. My point in both cases is not that they working 60+ hours per week, but that they were working, that is, spending their time in service to the patients and organization, not doing something unrelated or personal, for long, extended shifts. "Much of a teacher's day is not hard mental work." It's still work. It requires their full, or nearly so, attention.
  - dpark 5y ago
    You might be right. Some quick searches show several resources saying doctors work an average north of 50 hours/week, with some passing 60.

dpark 5y ago

> the doctors they worked with routinely worked 12 hrs/day, often 5 days per week, and then spent part of their 2 "off" days working as well. I have a lot of trouble believing this. You’re claiming that 60 hours minimum was standard for doctors yet somehow the nurses had enough sway to get away with 36 hours. Ignoring how much of that as “active work”, I have trouble believing they are even in the facility for that many hours. Maybe residents, because they do get worked to death, but post residency I can’t imagine you could keep doctors while working them like this. > My daughter-in-law, who teaches elementary school, has no "own time" between 8:00 AM and 4:00PM, other than a half hour break when her students are at lunch, and then works a couple of hours most evenings I think you missed part of the article. Much of a teacher’s day is not hard mental work. Especially for established teachers who have done the work to build lesson plans already.

walnutclosefarm 5y ago
Nurses are hourly employees and their employment terms are strongly influenced by the fact that many of the nurses in the employment area were unionized. The fact that they are hourly means there is a compelling financial incentive to limit their work time to 40 hours per week or less. The prevalence of unionized nurses in the market means that even non-union hospitals had to approximate the terms of the unionized ones, or they'd have unmanageable turnover, if they could even maintain staffing (nurses are in many markets scarce relative to demand). It was an academic medical center, so roughly 1/4 to 1/3 of the staff were residents or fellows. Most of the rest had joint appointments in the clinic or hospital and the medical school and research arm. I know their hours because they largely mimicked my hours. Most started by 6:30AM, and 7:00 at the latest. I often chatted with them in the parking garage 11 or 12 hours later. And not that I said they "routinely worked 12 hour days" not that they did it every day. My point in both cases is not that they working 60+ hours per week, but that they were working, that is, spending their time in service to the patients and organization, not doing something unrelated or personal, for long, extended shifts. "Much of a teacher's day is not hard mental work." It's still work. It requires their full, or nearly so, attention.
- dpark 5y ago
  You might be right. Some quick searches show several resources saying doctors work an average north of 50 hours/week, with some passing 60.