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People with high socioeconomic status work much more and have less free time. It’s absurd to claim otherwise. EDIT: please before being outraged at my comment

by azan_ 7mo ago

People with high socioeconomic status work much more and have less free time. It’s absurd to claim otherwise. EDIT: please before being outraged at my comment have a look at actual evidence, e.g. Time and income poverty by Tania Burchardt; bottom decile compared with top decile has 12 hours more free time a week!

shadowpho 7mo ago
Citation needed. Edit: it’s absolutely not true universally and it’s ridiculous to suggest it is. Comparing averages will be very tricky as well.
- azan_ 7mo ago
  Sure - https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf The difference between bottom and top decile is huge - bottom has approximately 12 hours more of free time a week! It’s consistent result that’s replicated multiple times in literature.
  - stinkbeetle 7mo ago
    It's astounding how easily people here swallowed the ~opposite claim -- that low income people can't find 30 minutes of leisure time, versus how they howl and object to yours. Even after you provide evidence, something never demanded or provided of the first claim.
alphager 7mo ago
People with 2 minimum wage jobs have even less time.
robertfw 7mo ago
how utterly disconnected from reality you are
- azan_ 7mo ago
  I’m afraid it’s you that’s disconnected from reality. I know it’s unfashionable to actually consider evidence, but please have a look at eg Time and income poverty by Tania Burchardt. Low income people have MUCH more free time.
  - ugiox 7mo ago
    Don’t know. But I am in the top 1% of this country regarding income as an engineer (staff/fellow level). I don’t work more than 32h-35h per week - actually I never have and was never expected to. Living and working in a sane society and country. I fanatically turn off work email or work msgs when not working. I am not available for no one. Not even the C-levels or any clients. I concentrate on me and my family. No need to be a slave to “commitments” that don’t mean a thing in the long run.
    - azan_ 7mo ago
      Good for you!
  - ugiox 7mo ago
    And everyone has the same 24h. And it is just their choice and will to either dedicate 30min to their well being or not. It is not about having less time. Just prioritizing the same 24h that everyone has differently. Everything else is just finding excuses which of course is much easier than changing your life.
  - hackable_sand 7mo ago
    But they don't
    - azan_ 7mo ago
      They do - https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf
- rexpop 7mo ago
swiftcoder 7mo ago
> People with high socioeconomic status work much more and have less free time I think you are misrepresenting (or perhaps, misunderstanding) the conclusion of these studies. The increased "free time" is most entirely due to high unemployment at the lower end of income. If you control for unemployment and under-employment, the graphs pretty much flatten out (as you can observe in the later graphs of the publication you linked below)
- carlosjobim 7mo ago
  Why should you exclude unemployed or underemployed? What would be the reason for that, other than to turn statistics into lies?
  - swiftcoder 7mo ago
    Because the vast majority of underemployed folks aren't underemployed by choice. The wealthy folks who decide to work 100-hour weeks on their startup, on the other hand, are making an explicit choice to spend their time that way, instead of lounging by the pool. If the argument is "bored rich folks like to play-act working in their free time", that's a very different argument than "poor people have more free time" There's also the confounding factor of the type of work folks are doing by socioeconomic status. The person packing heavy crates part time in an amazon warehouse may be working fewer hours than the software engineer at AWS, but they also may need higher recovery time due to the toll the physical nature of the work takes on their bodies.
    - carlosjobim 7mo ago
      In this subject matter - the health benefits of a sauna - it doesn't matter why somebody has enough free time to take a sauna. Is eating healthy more healthy for somebody who is rich and can hire a private chef, than it is for somebody who is unemployed and has a lot of time to cook healthy food. Is exercise more healthy for a rich person than for a poor person?
    - azan_ 7mo ago
      > If the argument is "bored rich folks like to play-act working in their free time", that's a very different argument than "poor people have more free time" I'm sorry but are you seriously considering "bored rich folks like to play-act working in their free time" to be real and widespread - among rich - phenomenon?
rfrey 7mo ago
Your point is even more graphically illustrated if you compare the extremes... Say trust fund babies to homeless people. The trust fund people spend at least ten hours a week reviewing investment and disciplining their entourage, whereas homeless people's time is completely their own.
- azan_ 7mo ago
  It's funny that you make this flippant remark, while people completely seriously use as absurd reverse scenario (for some reason asking to restrict analysis just to people working 2 minimum wage jobs and exclude people that are unemployed). I already know that people do not update their beliefs even when they are shown evidence that clearly shows they are wrong, but it's frustrating to experience every time nonetheless.
  - rfrey 7mo ago
    What you are describing is not evidence, it is a willful misuse (charitably perhaps, a misunderstanding) of statistics. It is exactly analogous to using a mean in a distribution with extreme outliers. The only reason is to hurl numbers around in an attempt to shore up a purely political position.
    - azan_ 7mo ago
      > What you are describing is not evidence, it is a willful misuse (charitably perhaps, a misunderstanding) of statistics. It is evidence that you don't want to accept because it's not compatible with your world view. And what do you offer instead - assumption that poor people are hard working folks and that rich people are slackers? And that's somehow not an attempt to shore up a purely political position? Please show ANY evidence supporting your thesis. Also it's not misuse of statistics at all! Mean is perfectly appropriate statistic here. Again - you make some assumption providing no support for it whatsoever.
grg0 7mo ago
That claim doesn't stand a chance? It's obviously non-linear; once you're really up there in the higher echelons of wealth, I'm sure you get a lot of time back.
rexpop 7mo ago
Imagine two kids get the weekend off from school. One kid gets money to order pizza, ride a fast taxi to the movies, and pay someone else to clean their room. They get to spend the whole weekend just playing and having fun. The other kid has no extra money. They have to spend their weekend cleaning the house, cooking meals from scratch, walking a long way just to get anywhere, and babysitting their little sibling. On a piece of paper, both kids had the exact same amount of "free time" away from school. But in real life, the second kid was actually working the whole time. Wealthy people can buy back their time by paying for things like daycare, grocery delivery, takeout, and house cleaning. People with less money can't afford to buy these shortcuts, so they have to do all this unpaid work themselves. This eats up their free hours. Jobs that pay less often change workers' schedules at the last minute, so they can never plan their days or get enough sleep. They also might have to ride slow public buses for a long time to get to work. This means their free time is broken into stressful little pieces, like waiting at a bus stop or waiting for an unexpected shift to start. Even when they do get an hour to sit down, they are usually very stressed about paying bills. When your brain is constantly worrying about survival, taking a break doesn't feel relaxing, and can even make you feel more anxious. So, while wealthy people might officially work more hours at their jobs, the money they make lets them buy real, relaxing rest. People with less money might have fewer official job hours, but their "free time" is entirely stolen by unpaid chores, unpredictable schedules, and the stressful work of just trying to survive. The long and short of it is that poor people work longer hours; they simply receive less formal recognition for it. Your attempts to hide these facts and paint poverty as enviable in this dimension are disgustingly inhumane.
- aaztehcy 7mo ago
  [flagged]
- azan_ 7mo ago
  > Your attempts to hide these facts and paint poverty as enviable in this dimension are disgustingly inhumane. The report I'm citing is using residuals after paid work, unpaid work and personal care. I suggest you should actually look at evidence instead of using some made up stories. Do poor people like one in your scenario exist? Of course. Are they large group? There's absolutely no reason to believe that (unless your world view depends on that) because evidence shows something completely opposite. It's surprising how gullible people here are - how can you actually believe that poor people do not have free 30 minutes a day? Please look at stats of time watching TV/day vs income. And if you want to have ACTUAL discussion I suggest you should focus on facts, not inventing tearjerker stories.

by azan_ 7mo ago

shadowpho 7mo ago

Citation needed. Edit: it’s absolutely not true universally and it’s ridiculous to suggest it is. Comparing averages will be very tricky as well.

azan_ 7mo ago
Sure - https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf The difference between bottom and top decile is huge - bottom has approximately 12 hours more of free time a week! It’s consistent result that’s replicated multiple times in literature.
- stinkbeetle 7mo ago
  It's astounding how easily people here swallowed the ~opposite claim -- that low income people can't find 30 minutes of leisure time, versus how they howl and object to yours. Even after you provide evidence, something never demanded or provided of the first claim.

alphager 7mo ago

People with 2 minimum wage jobs have even less time.

robertfw 7mo ago

how utterly disconnected from reality you are

azan_ 7mo ago
I’m afraid it’s you that’s disconnected from reality. I know it’s unfashionable to actually consider evidence, but please have a look at eg Time and income poverty by Tania Burchardt. Low income people have MUCH more free time.
- ugiox 7mo ago
  Don’t know. But I am in the top 1% of this country regarding income as an engineer (staff/fellow level). I don’t work more than 32h-35h per week - actually I never have and was never expected to. Living and working in a sane society and country. I fanatically turn off work email or work msgs when not working. I am not available for no one. Not even the C-levels or any clients. I concentrate on me and my family. No need to be a slave to “commitments” that don’t mean a thing in the long run.
  - azan_ 7mo ago
    Good for you!
- ugiox 7mo ago
  And everyone has the same 24h. And it is just their choice and will to either dedicate 30min to their well being or not. It is not about having less time. Just prioritizing the same 24h that everyone has differently. Everything else is just finding excuses which of course is much easier than changing your life.
- hackable_sand 7mo ago
  But they don't
  - azan_ 7mo ago
    They do - https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf https://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cr/CASEreport57.pdf
rexpop 7mo ago

swiftcoder 7mo ago

> People with high socioeconomic status work much more and have less free time I think you are misrepresenting (or perhaps, misunderstanding) the conclusion of these studies. The increased "free time" is most entirely due to high unemployment at the lower end of income. If you control for unemployment and under-employment, the graphs pretty much flatten out (as you can observe in the later graphs of the publication you linked below)

carlosjobim 7mo ago
Why should you exclude unemployed or underemployed? What would be the reason for that, other than to turn statistics into lies?
- swiftcoder 7mo ago
  Because the vast majority of underemployed folks aren't underemployed by choice. The wealthy folks who decide to work 100-hour weeks on their startup, on the other hand, are making an explicit choice to spend their time that way, instead of lounging by the pool. If the argument is "bored rich folks like to play-act working in their free time", that's a very different argument than "poor people have more free time" There's also the confounding factor of the type of work folks are doing by socioeconomic status. The person packing heavy crates part time in an amazon warehouse may be working fewer hours than the software engineer at AWS, but they also may need higher recovery time due to the toll the physical nature of the work takes on their bodies.
  - carlosjobim 7mo ago
    In this subject matter - the health benefits of a sauna - it doesn't matter why somebody has enough free time to take a sauna. Is eating healthy more healthy for somebody who is rich and can hire a private chef, than it is for somebody who is unemployed and has a lot of time to cook healthy food. Is exercise more healthy for a rich person than for a poor person?
  - azan_ 7mo ago
    > If the argument is "bored rich folks like to play-act working in their free time", that's a very different argument than "poor people have more free time" I'm sorry but are you seriously considering "bored rich folks like to play-act working in their free time" to be real and widespread - among rich - phenomenon?

rfrey 7mo ago

Your point is even more graphically illustrated if you compare the extremes... Say trust fund babies to homeless people. The trust fund people spend at least ten hours a week reviewing investment and disciplining their entourage, whereas homeless people's time is completely their own.

azan_ 7mo ago
It's funny that you make this flippant remark, while people completely seriously use as absurd reverse scenario (for some reason asking to restrict analysis just to people working 2 minimum wage jobs and exclude people that are unemployed). I already know that people do not update their beliefs even when they are shown evidence that clearly shows they are wrong, but it's frustrating to experience every time nonetheless.
- rfrey 7mo ago
  What you are describing is not evidence, it is a willful misuse (charitably perhaps, a misunderstanding) of statistics. It is exactly analogous to using a mean in a distribution with extreme outliers. The only reason is to hurl numbers around in an attempt to shore up a purely political position.
  - azan_ 7mo ago
    > What you are describing is not evidence, it is a willful misuse (charitably perhaps, a misunderstanding) of statistics. It is evidence that you don't want to accept because it's not compatible with your world view. And what do you offer instead - assumption that poor people are hard working folks and that rich people are slackers? And that's somehow not an attempt to shore up a purely political position? Please show ANY evidence supporting your thesis. Also it's not misuse of statistics at all! Mean is perfectly appropriate statistic here. Again - you make some assumption providing no support for it whatsoever.

grg0 7mo ago

That claim doesn't stand a chance? It's obviously non-linear; once you're really up there in the higher echelons of wealth, I'm sure you get a lot of time back.

rexpop 7mo ago

Imagine two kids get the weekend off from school. One kid gets money to order pizza, ride a fast taxi to the movies, and pay someone else to clean their room. They get to spend the whole weekend just playing and having fun. The other kid has no extra money. They have to spend their weekend cleaning the house, cooking meals from scratch, walking a long way just to get anywhere, and babysitting their little sibling. On a piece of paper, both kids had the exact same amount of "free time" away from school. But in real life, the second kid was actually working the whole time. Wealthy people can buy back their time by paying for things like daycare, grocery delivery, takeout, and house cleaning. People with less money can't afford to buy these shortcuts, so they have to do all this unpaid work themselves. This eats up their free hours. Jobs that pay less often change workers' schedules at the last minute, so they can never plan their days or get enough sleep. They also might have to ride slow public buses for a long time to get to work. This means their free time is broken into stressful little pieces, like waiting at a bus stop or waiting for an unexpected shift to start. Even when they do get an hour to sit down, they are usually very stressed about paying bills. When your brain is constantly worrying about survival, taking a break doesn't feel relaxing, and can even make you feel more anxious. So, while wealthy people might officially work more hours at their jobs, the money they make lets them buy real, relaxing rest. People with less money might have fewer official job hours, but their "free time" is entirely stolen by unpaid chores, unpredictable schedules, and the stressful work of just trying to survive. The long and short of it is that poor people work longer hours; they simply receive less formal recognition for it. Your attempts to hide these facts and paint poverty as enviable in this dimension are disgustingly inhumane.

aaztehcy 7mo ago
[flagged]
azan_ 7mo ago
> Your attempts to hide these facts and paint poverty as enviable in this dimension are disgustingly inhumane. The report I'm citing is using residuals after paid work, unpaid work and personal care. I suggest you should actually look at evidence instead of using some made up stories. Do poor people like one in your scenario exist? Of course. Are they large group? There's absolutely no reason to believe that (unless your world view depends on that) because evidence shows something completely opposite. It's surprising how gullible people here are - how can you actually believe that poor people do not have free 30 minutes a day? Please look at stats of time watching TV/day vs income. And if you want to have ACTUAL discussion I suggest you should focus on facts, not inventing tearjerker stories.