45-55/week of actual work, excluding internet time and lunch, including reading time (e.g. becoming a better programmer) and time spent thinking on work. I'm at

45-55/week of actual work, excluding internet time and lunch, including reading time (e.g. becoming a better programmer) and time spent thinking on work. I'm at a startup, so I'm lucky in terms of being able to spend most of my time on real work. College was 40-45/week including side projects. Grad school was 20-25/week (I wasn't a great student, and I didn't finish). First job out of school was 10-15/week (50+ office presence). Second-- trading at a hedge fund-- was about 35-45 (again, 50+ office presence). One nice thing about programming is that it's not an unrealistic aspiration to spend 30+ hours per week on actual work.