5 ms·

I've often thought that a company could recruit really great people by restricting the work week to three days and paying a proportionately lower salary.

by staunch 14y ago

jskulski 14y ago
I would love this.
rdl 14y ago
That would be particularly interesting in segments where either the standard is 60-100h/wk (games), or where 3 day/week people actually would be more useful (certain kinds of consulting or incident response? I don't know)
laluser 14y ago
Like working part-time? What's the difference?
- ksherlock 14y ago
  Some companies have reduced (or no) benefits for part time employees. Less tuition reimbursement (now that you have time to actually use it...), more out of pocket health insurance expenses (now that you're being paid less...). There's also a corporate culture where anyone working part time or remote isn't as committed to the company. Guess who's first in line for layoffs?
ekimekim 14y ago
You'd probably also need more careful contracts when it comes to stuff done outside of work, so it is feasible for someone to do two of these jobs at the same time, or one and a personal project.
darrhiggs 14y ago
I'm happy freelancing ~10hrs a week and earning about the UK's average wage. Three days a week at a company would be perfect.
- lifeisstillgood 14y ago
  How do you fill your pipeline
  - toomuchtodo 14y ago
    Also interested in answer to this.
    - darrhiggs 14y ago
      Tangentially, I did my degree in Economics and my dissertation on satisficing.[1] There are plenty of SMEs that need the help of a programmer, one that can understand how a business works and what it needs to be competitive. I started with some of the freelancing sites. It's hard to find decent work, but if you do it with an eye on building relationships it can be worthwhile. (pro-tip, put some money through the site and hire yourself; takes about a week to do without arousing suspicion, but then you have ∞ly more chance of geting hired [$50-100 dollars should be fine]) Business forums for accountants, truckers or anything, can also provide you with leads. Just make sure that you show an interest in their work, not just in getting work from them. Next, find a way to help the people that you've built relationships with make money. Adwords, I didn't know much about it, but a few hrs later and I had turned a 50€ a day campaign from loosing ~1/2 the π (profit) to doubling every day. (email me for some of the tricks) Google apps script is just js and easy to learn. With a small number of regexen etc and the simple APIs into google's services GAS gives you, I have been able to speed up ~5-10 jobs that were done daily, from taking ~3hrs, to the time it takes to click a button. Apps that would take a week or two elsewhere are 10hr/day jobs with GAS. This took about 6 months, but I have been working for about 1yr now at ~10hrs a week and I just ensure that people realise that 10hrs is my schedule and not to ask for more. I'm sure the _value_ I have provided to these businesses would allow me to double my rate tomorrow and face zero resistance; from ~£80k p.a pro rata, and I would say I am a moderate programmer at best. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing
toomuchtodo 14y ago
I'd take that offer, but I make $120K/year, so I can afford to lose 40% of my income. How about we regulate the number of hours in the work week according to productivity? If productivity is skyrocketing, why are we all still working at least 40 hours a week? http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/ http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/ "An average worker needs to work a mere 11 hours per week to produce as much as one working 40 hours per week in 1950. (The data here is from the US, but productivity increases in Europe and Japan have been of the same magnitude.) The conclusion is inescapable: if productivity means anything at all, a worker should be able to earn the same standard of living as a 1950 worker in only 11 hours per week. "
- vy8vWJlco 14y ago
  "If productivity is skyrocketing, why are we all still working at least 40 hours a week?" Because of 1) inflation/devaluation/taxation and economic mismanagement at the national level, 2) outsourcing/global wage-competition (when there are extreme global disparities), and contracting rather than long-term employment, 3) increasing corporate returns and executive remuneration coupled with the very small number of people who own stocks that would allow a person to actually benefit from corporate growth, and last but not least, 4) social-status competition and financial irresponsibility (for example, having children without financial stability, because everyone else is or because your spouse wants children, etc, etc). Also, very few of us own our own businesses so we are particularly subject to items 1, 2, and 3. 4 never helps, but it is hardly uncommon. Item 1 also has a nefarious hidden aspect to it: optimization without ownership is suicide. Ie, we are largely optimizing the processes and property of other people. Think of the workers displaced by the Industrial Revolution who lost their jobs. We are now working ourselves out of information jobs (publishing, for example). That in and of itself is not a problem but progress, however by working for a wage as the majority of us do, we retain no ownership of the proceeds and so have gotten no farther ahead, while prices continue to rise (say hello to our old friend communism). The lack of ownership results in modern resentment and job protectionism, and the economic equivalent of Munchausen syndrome by which we create new problems, or sustain existing ones, in order to remain the recipient of a benefit. (For example, we delay technological convergence in order to capitalize on the transition...)
katzgrau 14y ago
Totally, then everyone could work on their startup the other 4 days of the week.
- Afforess 14y ago
  You joke, but I would.
- toomuchtodo 14y ago
  What you do with your leisure time is still up to you.
Afforess 14y ago
Where do I sign up?
outside1234 14y ago
the problem in this is benefits. those are expensive and price inelastic.
- toomuchtodo 14y ago
  This would be solved with single payer. Would remove a ton of inefficiency from the system, as well as increase worker job mobility.
r00fus 14y ago
I have a friend in France who went to a job interview for a contract position - he was expecting 25% pay more than the employer had budget for. Though the employer was pretty interested in him, my friend exited the interview, effectively saying, "well, looks like we're at an impasse - thanks for your time and please call me if you reconsider". On his way back home the employer called him and asked him if, considering he just recently had a kid (note: not legal to ask for that here in the states), he would be amenable to lowered pay for commensurate lowered hours (ie, 4 days a week). He accepted happily. He was disappointed he only got a 1 year contract as opposed to 2 years - I was flabbergasted when I heard that - not sure anyone would ever get that kind of employment guarantee here in the US for contract work. It's about time we started considering salary employment contracts for fewer days than the standard five.
- rdouble 14y ago
  I used to do contract programming work for grant funded research and would have 1 or 2 year funding guarantees.
pchristensen 14y ago
Verba software offers this deal the first of every month, most recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5475063 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5475063 (well, it's always offered, but they post in on HN Who's Hiring on the 1st)

I've often thought that a company could recruit really great people by restricting the work week to three days and paying a proportionately lower salary.

by staunch 14y ago

I've often thought that a company could recruit really great people by restricting the work week to three days and paying a proportionately lower salary.

jskulski 14y ago

I would love this.

rdl 14y ago

That would be particularly interesting in segments where either the standard is 60-100h/wk (games), or where 3 day/week people actually would be more useful (certain kinds of consulting or incident response? I don't know)

laluser 14y ago

Like working part-time? What's the difference?

ksherlock 14y ago
Some companies have reduced (or no) benefits for part time employees. Less tuition reimbursement (now that you have time to actually use it...), more out of pocket health insurance expenses (now that you're being paid less...). There's also a corporate culture where anyone working part time or remote isn't as committed to the company. Guess who's first in line for layoffs?

ekimekim 14y ago

You'd probably also need more careful contracts when it comes to stuff done outside of work, so it is feasible for someone to do two of these jobs at the same time, or one and a personal project.

darrhiggs 14y ago

I'm happy freelancing ~10hrs a week and earning about the UK's average wage. Three days a week at a company would be perfect.

lifeisstillgood 14y ago
How do you fill your pipeline
- toomuchtodo 14y ago
  Also interested in answer to this.
  - darrhiggs 14y ago
    Tangentially, I did my degree in Economics and my dissertation on satisficing.[1] There are plenty of SMEs that need the help of a programmer, one that can understand how a business works and what it needs to be competitive. I started with some of the freelancing sites. It's hard to find decent work, but if you do it with an eye on building relationships it can be worthwhile. (pro-tip, put some money through the site and hire yourself; takes about a week to do without arousing suspicion, but then you have ∞ly more chance of geting hired [$50-100 dollars should be fine]) Business forums for accountants, truckers or anything, can also provide you with leads. Just make sure that you show an interest in their work, not just in getting work from them. Next, find a way to help the people that you've built relationships with make money. Adwords, I didn't know much about it, but a few hrs later and I had turned a 50€ a day campaign from loosing ~1/2 the π (profit) to doubling every day. (email me for some of the tricks) Google apps script is just js and easy to learn. With a small number of regexen etc and the simple APIs into google's services GAS gives you, I have been able to speed up ~5-10 jobs that were done daily, from taking ~3hrs, to the time it takes to click a button. Apps that would take a week or two elsewhere are 10hr/day jobs with GAS. This took about 6 months, but I have been working for about 1yr now at ~10hrs a week and I just ensure that people realise that 10hrs is my schedule and not to ask for more. I'm sure the _value_ I have provided to these businesses would allow me to double my rate tomorrow and face zero resistance; from ~£80k p.a pro rata, and I would say I am a moderate programmer at best. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing

toomuchtodo 14y ago

I'd take that offer, but I make $120K/year, so I can afford to lose 40% of my income. How about we regulate the number of hours in the work week according to productivity? If productivity is skyrocketing, why are we all still working at least 40 hours a week? http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/ http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/ "An average worker needs to work a mere 11 hours per week to produce as much as one working 40 hours per week in 1950. (The data here is from the US, but productivity increases in Europe and Japan have been of the same magnitude.) The conclusion is inescapable: if productivity means anything at all, a worker should be able to earn the same standard of living as a 1950 worker in only 11 hours per week. "

vy8vWJlco 14y ago
"If productivity is skyrocketing, why are we all still working at least 40 hours a week?" Because of 1) inflation/devaluation/taxation and economic mismanagement at the national level, 2) outsourcing/global wage-competition (when there are extreme global disparities), and contracting rather than long-term employment, 3) increasing corporate returns and executive remuneration coupled with the very small number of people who own stocks that would allow a person to actually benefit from corporate growth, and last but not least, 4) social-status competition and financial irresponsibility (for example, having children without financial stability, because everyone else is or because your spouse wants children, etc, etc). Also, very few of us own our own businesses so we are particularly subject to items 1, 2, and 3. 4 never helps, but it is hardly uncommon. Item 1 also has a nefarious hidden aspect to it: optimization without ownership is suicide. Ie, we are largely optimizing the processes and property of other people. Think of the workers displaced by the Industrial Revolution who lost their jobs. We are now working ourselves out of information jobs (publishing, for example). That in and of itself is not a problem but progress, however by working for a wage as the majority of us do, we retain no ownership of the proceeds and so have gotten no farther ahead, while prices continue to rise (say hello to our old friend communism). The lack of ownership results in modern resentment and job protectionism, and the economic equivalent of Munchausen syndrome by which we create new problems, or sustain existing ones, in order to remain the recipient of a benefit. (For example, we delay technological convergence in order to capitalize on the transition...)

katzgrau 14y ago

Totally, then everyone could work on their startup the other 4 days of the week.

Afforess 14y ago
You joke, but I would.
toomuchtodo 14y ago
What you do with your leisure time is still up to you.

Afforess 14y ago

Where do I sign up?

outside1234 14y ago

the problem in this is benefits. those are expensive and price inelastic.

toomuchtodo 14y ago
This would be solved with single payer. Would remove a ton of inefficiency from the system, as well as increase worker job mobility.

r00fus 14y ago

I have a friend in France who went to a job interview for a contract position - he was expecting 25% pay more than the employer had budget for. Though the employer was pretty interested in him, my friend exited the interview, effectively saying, "well, looks like we're at an impasse - thanks for your time and please call me if you reconsider". On his way back home the employer called him and asked him if, considering he just recently had a kid (note: not legal to ask for that here in the states), he would be amenable to lowered pay for commensurate lowered hours (ie, 4 days a week). He accepted happily. He was disappointed he only got a 1 year contract as opposed to 2 years - I was flabbergasted when I heard that - not sure anyone would ever get that kind of employment guarantee here in the US for contract work. It's about time we started considering salary employment contracts for fewer days than the standard five.

rdouble 14y ago
I used to do contract programming work for grant funded research and would have 1 or 2 year funding guarantees.

pchristensen 14y ago

Verba software offers this deal the first of every month, most recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5475063 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5475063 (well, it's always offered, but they post in on HN Who's Hiring on the 1st)