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

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.