Looking at the just the productivity aspect of sleeping less, I have yet to see a study that accounts for the extra waking time that people have when they sleep

Looking at the just the productivity aspect of sleeping less, I have yet to see a study that accounts for the extra waking time that people have when they sleep less. How much you get done = rate of work * time working. Many studies have shown that the rate at which people can "work" (which means something like respond to visual stimulus) decreases when people sleep less. I haven't seen a study that compares this decrease in rate to the increase in time available for work. If I have to do a task 1000 times each day and each time takes me 2 seconds longer on 5 hours of sleep than it does on 8, it'll take me 2000s ~= 34 extra minutes to do the task 1000x when I'm on less sleep, but then I still have 2.5 hours left out of the 3 that I decided not to sleep. (Numbers from this inspired by [1]) I acknowledge the health issues of chronic sleep deprivation. [1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/30/sleep-deprivation-work-slower-productivity-speed_n_1720700.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/30/sleep-deprivation-w...