I lived in the east coast (Boston), and have many friends that live in NYC, and the culture is very different over there. If you are not in by 9 am., it looks b

I lived in the east coast (Boston), and have many friends that live in NYC, and the culture is very different over there. If you are not in by 9 am., it looks bad. Even if you are done with your work, and more, or can't be any more productive, you still have to stay in to put your hours. You feel extra guilty just for asking a couple of hours off to go to the dentist or fix your car. etc. etc. Management doesn't trust you for sure, and half of the sites or the internet are blocked. If you work in the financial industry, you can't use any external/personal email, im, or whatever. The email firewall is there for security reasons, or so it's said. I don't know that what you're describing is a "New York" phenomenon, but it's certainly true on Wall Street. I worked at a hedge fund where I ran into exactly what you're talking about. I developed substantial health problems for a period of about 2 months. Having a strong work ethic, and not wanting to call in sick needlessly (it wasn't contagious) I showed up to work whenever I could-- sometimes arriving late or leaving early, or taking a midday break, but still putting in the 45-50 hours that was expected. I found out the hard way that it's worse to show up a half-hour late because of illness than to call in sick and throw out a day-- this is obviously stupid, inefficient, and bizarre. I had a new boss who gave me a ration of shit for showing up 8 minutes late (I was puking during that 8 minutes; thanks) and threatened to fire me. I sent him an email basically telling him that I worked for the company, not him, and that it was unfair both to me, but "more importantly" unfair to the company, to destroy a day's worth of my productivity over 8 minutes in the morning. I don't work there any more.