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Meanwhile in China... Excerpts below taken from the website https://996.icu/#/en_US https://996.icu/#/en_US What is "996"? 996 working, ICU waiting. A "996"

Meanwhile in China... Excerpts below taken from the website https://996.icu/#/en_US https://996.icu/#/en_US What is "996"? 996 working, ICU waiting. A "996" work schedule refers to an unofficial work schedule (9a.m. ~ 9p.m., 6 days a week) that has been gaining in popularity. Serving a company that encourages the "996" work schedule usually means working for at least 60 hours a week. In early September 2016, it was said that 58.com (58同城, a classified advertisements company) introduced the "996" work schedule, without paying employees overtime who worked on weekends. The company later claimed that the schedule was only practiced managing extra workflow during peak season - September and October, and that the schedule was not compulsory. In early 2019, Youzan (有赞, a Hangzhou-based E-commerce company) announced the company would adopt "996" work schedule in the annual convention. Bai Ya, the CEO of Youzan, responded: "This will definitely be a right decision when we look back in a few years." In mid-March 2019, it was reported that JD.com (京东, a major E-commerce company) started adopting "996" or "995" work schedules in some departments. The PR posted that (Our culture is) to devote ourselves wholeheartedly (to achieve the business objectives) via Maimai (脉脉, a Chinese real-name business social network platform). Gaining more publicity only recently, this work schedule, however, has long been a known "secret" practiced in a lot of companies in China.

s5300 4y ago
There are some rich people in the US who endorse 996. Calacanis being one. Imagine trying to be a bigger piece of shit. Japan isn’t even 996 & they’re going to have to start forcing people to have kids at gunpoint or kinda implode as a nation. Near purely because of their abysmal work culture. I recall when Cards Against Humanity paid for their overseas factory workers a day off by paying for a full factory day with a quota of zero or something like that. All they asked was that the workers spend time with family & send a picture if they do anything special. A ton of heartwarming but also incredibly sad to think about pictures came in, like a family celebrating their very young child’s birthday in a closet of an apartment. Tiny little home baked cupcake with a singular candle. They wouldn’t have even gotten to celebrate that in the slightest without their day off, paid by foreigners indescribably richer than them that they’ve never met nor likely will meet.
- AndyMcConachie 4y ago
  - jimmydeans 4y ago
  - ClumsyPilot 4y ago
    Continue that line of through - whats the gameplan? Then those foreigners are forced into the same work culture that makes having a family impossible? What's next? Contunue leaching off countries that actually support sustainable survival of the human species?
    - avisser 4y ago
      This is an overly flip answer, but this seems to be America's game plan.
  - silon42 4y ago
    That's an alternative way to implode as a nation.
  - ryan93 4y ago
    Its not racist. I would support it if you are personally willing to take the punishment for any heinous crimes committed by immigrants.
    - femiagbabiaka 4y ago
      It’s not racist!! > makes it even more racist
      - ClumsyPilot 4y ago
        Don't you know that two racisms in opposite direction cancell out and you have no racism left
hdjjhhvvhga 4y ago
This is terrible, unfair, and morally wrong, but we can understand what it comes from: this is a difference between the so-called "developed" and "developing" countries. Because why do we work? To have money so that we can live comfortably. Work is not meant to fill in 40 or more hours of our life, it's just a means to and end. If we can have enough money by working less, many people chose this way. In the meantime, in most countries of the world it's not an option: you might need to work much more just to survive. A sad reality and something that I hope changes one day, once the old generations (thinking in terms of nations and wars and not realizing all human beings are mutually interdependent) pass away.
- dgb23 4y ago
  That's the difference between suppressing/co-opting grass roots worker movements versus negotiating with them and incorporating some leverage through rights and regulations. The 40h 5d workweek was a radical demand not so long ago.
- forinti 4y ago
  China is a modern country. I don't think Jack Ma's 996 makes any sense. If you apply it to manual labour, you will get sick people. If you apply it to intellectual work, people will just pretend to work. I think he is just plain greedy.
  - adamhp 4y ago
    > If you apply it to manual labour, you will get sick people. If you apply it to intellectual work, people will just pretend to work. I've always been for the reduction of work hours, but this is a really good concise point that I'll put in my pocket. Thanks.
    - hdjjhhvvhga 4y ago
      Actually, intellectual work - that in most cases is done by sitting in front of a computer - also causes illnesses, just different from those caused by manual labor. For me this is the largest boon of the pandemic revolution: I can take as many exercise breaks as I want without anyone judging me, I can do some parts of my work while cycling,* and I can adjust my work position they way I like. None of these is possible without disturbing my colleagues in the office. *) Especially meetings! Man, so many of these are such a terrible waste of time! But not mine: I burn calories and become more fit. If only we could have been reasonable and implemented such policies without the need for a pandemic to erupt.
29athrowaway 4y ago
Jack Ma said 996 was a blessing. Then he said other things that pissed off the wrong people and has not been seen since then.
- sokoloff 4y ago
  He has been very rarely, but not never, seen since then. https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3177452/jack-ma-makes-rare-public-appearance-alibaba-hangzhou-campus https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3177452/jack-ma-m...
- MisterBastahrd 4y ago
  Guys like Jack Ma consider being awake to be working. It's how a former CEO of mine justified his 10 week a year vacation schedule with 2.5 day work weeks. The man would walk into the office after a weekend at around 11:30am on a Tuesday to select a few employees to eat lunch with, and then make up for his missed work by staying until 7:30 on Thursdays.
lvl102 4y ago
Let’s be honest, if you ever worked in East Asian countries with these work ethic culture, you’d know they just sit around the office doing absolutely nothing. It’s bullshit.
- lostcohort 4y ago
  Even on this very forum you people will consistently brag that they only work a couple hours a week at their 500k job.
  - meheleventyone 4y ago
    Not even just this forum, there have been plenty of articles about data of varying quality showing that vanishingly few people actually work a full 8 hour day and/or are capable of actually sustaining heavy thought for that long anyway!
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - onion2k 4y ago
    If you can generate enough value in 2 hours to justify 500k a year then that's fine.
- erazor42 4y ago
  100% agree, I personally would probably have the same weekly productivity in 965 vs 996. Brain resting is pretty important.
  - IMTDb 4y ago
    I think a significant point in the 996 is also to ensure people are available, not only productive. Most probably are extremely productive few hours per day (let's assume 4) and few days per week (let's also assume 4). We could all be performing almost all our weekly tasks in about 16 - extremely targeted and focused - hours. SO it might be easy to think we should only be working 16 hours per week and that would be enough. Yet, if people were only working 16 hour per week, the company would stop to a crawl. Because during my extremely productive, I might need a few non productive hours from you. Maybe it's answering a quick question, maybe is giving me a pointer to something, on inviting me to a document, enough that I can keep progressing without being blocked and getting those golden 16 hours interrupted and wasted. The point is that, even tho these are not productive hours for you, they are creating a massive value for the company because you can be supporting other people productive hours. And maybe those are happening on a Saturday from 6 to 9 PM. In fact it might even be OK for the company to tire you a bit, to get that availability, even if that means you won't have 16 hours of quality work anymore. This is not in defense on the 996, but it is to balance the whole point that people should only be working when they really are productive/focused/.... Availability, even non productive does matter as well.
froh 4y ago
That does exist in _some_ companies but it's not "the norm".
- lostcohort 4y ago
  Exactly, but people just love to parrot it. It'd be like taking banking hours as the norm here. > Bob Diamond on brutal working hours for junior bankers: ‘I’d do it again in a nanosecond’ [1] [1] https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/bob-diamond-on-brutal-working-hours-for-junior-bankers-id-do-it-again-in-a-nanosecond-20220518 https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/bob-diamond-on-brutal-work...
HWR_14 4y ago
I thought the Chinese government was pushing back on 996.
FabHK 4y ago
One of my all-time-favourite Onion stories, which is so stinging because of its kernel of truth: Chinese Employers To Grant 15-Minute Maternity Break https://www.theonion.com/chinese-employers-to-grant-15-minute-maternity-break-1819568485 https://www.theonion.com/chinese-employers-to-grant-15-minut...
exabrial 4y ago
Former "large China FAANG" employee here so I can speak authoritatively on this. These things above fail to take in the culture aspect. Generally, "being present" is considered "work", so the idea is to be present in the office for all of these hours. When "we" (Americans) showed up at 8a-9a, busted out an enormous of amount of code, email, meetings, etc then left at 4p-5p was quite a shock to our native compadres. One of the managers actually asked us to slow down as they weren't able to keep up and were causing problems. A snooty person would claim "oh look how much better the American system is", but it's much more complex than that. First, the Chinese have a very interesting total life integration. You still get married at late biblical ages (15-19), your parents move in with you and take care of the kids, you generally don't own many things (including a house), and your job and coworkers are friends and very much part of your life; you'll eat three meals a day with them and talk long walks. Your job pace is much slower and therefore, hours much longer. Americans tend to live these absurd double identities, where we have coworkers our spouses will never meet, and we rarely interact with said coworkers outside of work, which is quite a culture shock to the Chinese. There was just another thread on HN about "fundatory activities", and how badly they can go over, which simply wouldn't exist in China. In the end, just a different system, based on completely different national ideals. It's hard to understand until you're there living and breathing it.
- mcv 4y ago
  Even so, what's the point of "being present" at work and not actually working? I'd rather spend that time with my family or friends.
  - wbsss4412 4y ago
    I think they just explained it in their comment… your coworkers are your friends. I think the flip side of what you’re saying is, why would you not want to be friends with the people you spend 8+ hours a day with during the workweek?
    - mcv 4y ago
      And if you get fired, you get fired from being friends with them too? I certainly want to be able to get along with my coworkers, but it's not quite the same thing as being friends. There are few former coworkers that I keep in touch with after I leave a job. I tend to have my friends outside work. And my family too.

s5300 4y ago

There are some rich people in the US who endorse 996. Calacanis being one. Imagine trying to be a bigger piece of shit. Japan isn’t even 996 & they’re going to have to start forcing people to have kids at gunpoint or kinda implode as a nation. Near purely because of their abysmal work culture. I recall when Cards Against Humanity paid for their overseas factory workers a day off by paying for a full factory day with a quota of zero or something like that. All they asked was that the workers spend time with family & send a picture if they do anything special. A ton of heartwarming but also incredibly sad to think about pictures came in, like a family celebrating their very young child’s birthday in a closet of an apartment. Tiny little home baked cupcake with a singular candle. They wouldn’t have even gotten to celebrate that in the slightest without their day off, paid by foreigners indescribably richer than them that they’ve never met nor likely will meet.

AndyMcConachie 4y ago
- jimmydeans 4y ago
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  Continue that line of through - whats the gameplan? Then those foreigners are forced into the same work culture that makes having a family impossible? What's next? Contunue leaching off countries that actually support sustainable survival of the human species?
  - avisser 4y ago
    This is an overly flip answer, but this seems to be America's game plan.
- silon42 4y ago
  That's an alternative way to implode as a nation.
- ryan93 4y ago
  Its not racist. I would support it if you are personally willing to take the punishment for any heinous crimes committed by immigrants.
  - femiagbabiaka 4y ago
    It’s not racist!! > makes it even more racist
    - ClumsyPilot 4y ago
      Don't you know that two racisms in opposite direction cancell out and you have no racism left

hdjjhhvvhga 4y ago

This is terrible, unfair, and morally wrong, but we can understand what it comes from: this is a difference between the so-called "developed" and "developing" countries. Because why do we work? To have money so that we can live comfortably. Work is not meant to fill in 40 or more hours of our life, it's just a means to and end. If we can have enough money by working less, many people chose this way. In the meantime, in most countries of the world it's not an option: you might need to work much more just to survive. A sad reality and something that I hope changes one day, once the old generations (thinking in terms of nations and wars and not realizing all human beings are mutually interdependent) pass away.

dgb23 4y ago
That's the difference between suppressing/co-opting grass roots worker movements versus negotiating with them and incorporating some leverage through rights and regulations. The 40h 5d workweek was a radical demand not so long ago.
forinti 4y ago
China is a modern country. I don't think Jack Ma's 996 makes any sense. If you apply it to manual labour, you will get sick people. If you apply it to intellectual work, people will just pretend to work. I think he is just plain greedy.
- adamhp 4y ago
  > If you apply it to manual labour, you will get sick people. If you apply it to intellectual work, people will just pretend to work. I've always been for the reduction of work hours, but this is a really good concise point that I'll put in my pocket. Thanks.
  - hdjjhhvvhga 4y ago
    Actually, intellectual work - that in most cases is done by sitting in front of a computer - also causes illnesses, just different from those caused by manual labor. For me this is the largest boon of the pandemic revolution: I can take as many exercise breaks as I want without anyone judging me, I can do some parts of my work while cycling,* and I can adjust my work position they way I like. None of these is possible without disturbing my colleagues in the office. *) Especially meetings! Man, so many of these are such a terrible waste of time! But not mine: I burn calories and become more fit. If only we could have been reasonable and implemented such policies without the need for a pandemic to erupt.

29athrowaway 4y ago

Jack Ma said 996 was a blessing. Then he said other things that pissed off the wrong people and has not been seen since then.

sokoloff 4y ago
He has been very rarely, but not never, seen since then. https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3177452/jack-ma-makes-rare-public-appearance-alibaba-hangzhou-campus https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3177452/jack-ma-m...
MisterBastahrd 4y ago
Guys like Jack Ma consider being awake to be working. It's how a former CEO of mine justified his 10 week a year vacation schedule with 2.5 day work weeks. The man would walk into the office after a weekend at around 11:30am on a Tuesday to select a few employees to eat lunch with, and then make up for his missed work by staying until 7:30 on Thursdays.

lvl102 4y ago

Let’s be honest, if you ever worked in East Asian countries with these work ethic culture, you’d know they just sit around the office doing absolutely nothing. It’s bullshit.

lostcohort 4y ago
Even on this very forum you people will consistently brag that they only work a couple hours a week at their 500k job.
- meheleventyone 4y ago
  Not even just this forum, there have been plenty of articles about data of varying quality showing that vanishingly few people actually work a full 8 hour day and/or are capable of actually sustaining heavy thought for that long anyway!
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- onion2k 4y ago
  If you can generate enough value in 2 hours to justify 500k a year then that's fine.
erazor42 4y ago
100% agree, I personally would probably have the same weekly productivity in 965 vs 996. Brain resting is pretty important.
- IMTDb 4y ago
  I think a significant point in the 996 is also to ensure people are available, not only productive. Most probably are extremely productive few hours per day (let's assume 4) and few days per week (let's also assume 4). We could all be performing almost all our weekly tasks in about 16 - extremely targeted and focused - hours. SO it might be easy to think we should only be working 16 hours per week and that would be enough. Yet, if people were only working 16 hour per week, the company would stop to a crawl. Because during my extremely productive, I might need a few non productive hours from you. Maybe it's answering a quick question, maybe is giving me a pointer to something, on inviting me to a document, enough that I can keep progressing without being blocked and getting those golden 16 hours interrupted and wasted. The point is that, even tho these are not productive hours for you, they are creating a massive value for the company because you can be supporting other people productive hours. And maybe those are happening on a Saturday from 6 to 9 PM. In fact it might even be OK for the company to tire you a bit, to get that availability, even if that means you won't have 16 hours of quality work anymore. This is not in defense on the 996, but it is to balance the whole point that people should only be working when they really are productive/focused/.... Availability, even non productive does matter as well.

froh 4y ago

That does exist in _some_ companies but it's not "the norm".

lostcohort 4y ago
Exactly, but people just love to parrot it. It'd be like taking banking hours as the norm here. > Bob Diamond on brutal working hours for junior bankers: ‘I’d do it again in a nanosecond’ [1] [1] https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/bob-diamond-on-brutal-working-hours-for-junior-bankers-id-do-it-again-in-a-nanosecond-20220518 https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/bob-diamond-on-brutal-work...

HWR_14 4y ago

I thought the Chinese government was pushing back on 996.

FabHK 4y ago

One of my all-time-favourite Onion stories, which is so stinging because of its kernel of truth: Chinese Employers To Grant 15-Minute Maternity Break https://www.theonion.com/chinese-employers-to-grant-15-minute-maternity-break-1819568485 https://www.theonion.com/chinese-employers-to-grant-15-minut...

exabrial 4y ago

Former "large China FAANG" employee here so I can speak authoritatively on this. These things above fail to take in the culture aspect. Generally, "being present" is considered "work", so the idea is to be present in the office for all of these hours. When "we" (Americans) showed up at 8a-9a, busted out an enormous of amount of code, email, meetings, etc then left at 4p-5p was quite a shock to our native compadres. One of the managers actually asked us to slow down as they weren't able to keep up and were causing problems. A snooty person would claim "oh look how much better the American system is", but it's much more complex than that. First, the Chinese have a very interesting total life integration. You still get married at late biblical ages (15-19), your parents move in with you and take care of the kids, you generally don't own many things (including a house), and your job and coworkers are friends and very much part of your life; you'll eat three meals a day with them and talk long walks. Your job pace is much slower and therefore, hours much longer. Americans tend to live these absurd double identities, where we have coworkers our spouses will never meet, and we rarely interact with said coworkers outside of work, which is quite a culture shock to the Chinese. There was just another thread on HN about "fundatory activities", and how badly they can go over, which simply wouldn't exist in China. In the end, just a different system, based on completely different national ideals. It's hard to understand until you're there living and breathing it.

mcv 4y ago
Even so, what's the point of "being present" at work and not actually working? I'd rather spend that time with my family or friends.
- wbsss4412 4y ago
  I think they just explained it in their comment… your coworkers are your friends. I think the flip side of what you’re saying is, why would you not want to be friends with the people you spend 8+ hours a day with during the workweek?
  - mcv 4y ago
    And if you get fired, you get fired from being friends with them too? I certainly want to be able to get along with my coworkers, but it's not quite the same thing as being friends. There are few former coworkers that I keep in touch with after I leave a job. I tend to have my friends outside work. And my family too.