5 ms·

If we allow shipping companies to work on sundays, we should also allow some warehouse employees to work on sundays. Now all these companies will need electrici

by jakobe 13y ago

If we allow shipping companies to work on sundays, we should also allow some warehouse employees to work on sundays. Now all these companies will need electricians and mechanics that work on the weekend to fix stuff that breaks on weekends, because else they would have to wait until monday to continue working. These technicians will need to get their spare parts somewhere, so their distributors need to work on the weekend too. With so many people working on the weekend, it'll be necessary for typical white collar workers to work on the weekend, because a business owner doesn't want to wait until Monday for his accountant to do the paperwork for his new weekend employees. At some point the IT system of a shipping company, or a warehouse, or an accountant will fail on a sunday, and then some HN reader will have to go to work on sunday and miss the delivery of some parcel they ordered and they will have to wait until monday anyway.

unsignedint 13y ago
Actually I thought of the same thing when I read the article. These expectations are what making Japanese working environments so insane like unpaid hours and people fatiguing to death -- though I won't say such expectations would create same effect as mindset and legal ramifications are different, but these changes can create shift in peoples' expectations and someone do have to pay for it.
rb2k_ 13y ago
That chain of events is a bit questionable since there are already enough people working on Sundays. Hospitals, Restaurants, Police, ...
- jakobe 13y ago
  Yes, and all these things already require a lot of people to work on the weekend. Blood transfusions are delivered on weekends just fine. But that's no reason to allow consumer electronics to be delivered on Sunday...
  - eli 13y ago
    "People willing to pay for it" sounds like a reason
  - rz2k 13y ago
    So people who work in retail stores open on the weekends work 56 hour weeks rather than 40 hour weeks? I feel really bad for the people working in the drugstore now! Just to be clear, the idea that weekly cyclicality in demand for labor, or any restriction on demand for labor hurts employee welfare makes little sense when the legislative efforts already focus on labor friendly restrictions on supply. In fact, one of the ways that unions served their members was by insisting that outmoded positions (eg. coal shoveler on a diesel-electric train) were still filled. In general, labor interests are served when employers need more work done, and the supply of labor is constrained through things like limits to how many hours can be worked in a stretch without a break and when overtime pay is required. (I say in general, because everyone is also a consumer, so efficiency and productivity gains are not a net loss, they're a net gain)
  - jsolson 13y ago
    I can go into a store and buy it on Sunday. Why should delivery be any different?
    - kubiiii 13y ago
      It should not. The question might be why going into a store on sundays?
      - jsolson 13y ago
        Why not? Stores or more or less universally open, and I've got the day off.
utopkara 13y ago
That HN reader will probably take Mondays off. The real question is: Will this will just create more jobs in the end? I am not sure though. Because, it will make life even harder for B&M stores. I already use only the local hardware store, and the bicycle shop as far as the local retail stores go. Even then the nearest bicycle shop closed last summer after many years of service.
xxpor 13y ago
I noticed you're from Austria. If the rules in Austria are like I understand them to be in Germany, you're actually not allowed to work on Sunday. There are no laws against that the the US. Most stores are already open on Sunday, and plenty of people work.

by jakobe 13y ago

unsignedint 13y ago

Actually I thought of the same thing when I read the article. These expectations are what making Japanese working environments so insane like unpaid hours and people fatiguing to death -- though I won't say such expectations would create same effect as mindset and legal ramifications are different, but these changes can create shift in peoples' expectations and someone do have to pay for it.

rb2k_ 13y ago

That chain of events is a bit questionable since there are already enough people working on Sundays. Hospitals, Restaurants, Police, ...

jakobe 13y ago
Yes, and all these things already require a lot of people to work on the weekend. Blood transfusions are delivered on weekends just fine. But that's no reason to allow consumer electronics to be delivered on Sunday...
- eli 13y ago
  "People willing to pay for it" sounds like a reason
- rz2k 13y ago
  So people who work in retail stores open on the weekends work 56 hour weeks rather than 40 hour weeks? I feel really bad for the people working in the drugstore now! Just to be clear, the idea that weekly cyclicality in demand for labor, or any restriction on demand for labor hurts employee welfare makes little sense when the legislative efforts already focus on labor friendly restrictions on supply. In fact, one of the ways that unions served their members was by insisting that outmoded positions (eg. coal shoveler on a diesel-electric train) were still filled. In general, labor interests are served when employers need more work done, and the supply of labor is constrained through things like limits to how many hours can be worked in a stretch without a break and when overtime pay is required. (I say in general, because everyone is also a consumer, so efficiency and productivity gains are not a net loss, they're a net gain)
- jsolson 13y ago
  I can go into a store and buy it on Sunday. Why should delivery be any different?
  - kubiiii 13y ago
    It should not. The question might be why going into a store on sundays?
    - jsolson 13y ago
      Why not? Stores or more or less universally open, and I've got the day off.

utopkara 13y ago

That HN reader will probably take Mondays off. The real question is: Will this will just create more jobs in the end? I am not sure though. Because, it will make life even harder for B&M stores. I already use only the local hardware store, and the bicycle shop as far as the local retail stores go. Even then the nearest bicycle shop closed last summer after many years of service.

xxpor 13y ago

I noticed you're from Austria. If the rules in Austria are like I understand them to be in Germany, you're actually not allowed to work on Sunday. There are no laws against that the the US. Most stores are already open on Sunday, and plenty of people work.