8 ms·

Enact a 20-hour work week. Our machines are powerful enough now that we should be able to devote our lives to human dignity, not work. Technology will only turn

Enact a 20-hour work week. Our machines are powerful enough now that we should be able to devote our lives to human dignity, not work. Technology will only turn our world into a Dickensian hellhole if we let it.

justinmk 12y ago
Humans want services from other humans. If humans aren't willing or able to pay other humans to do things, something is preventing that. Anything that can be provided by machines at negligible cost becomes a "general condition" (like air), so it isn't relevant to scarcity. If something is still scarce after that, it means some human labor is needed to provide it (or a bad actor is preventing it--e.g., labor laws or whatever).
- rewqfdsa 12y ago
  But I'm not sure what point you're making. If market forces can operate in a world with a 40 hour default work week, they can operate in a world with a 20 hour work week. At the macroeconomic level, we're talking about tweaking a coefficient. So what? By shortening the work week, we can give many more people an opportunity to engage in dignified work, give them more leisure time, and spur further investment in labor-saving machinery, all in the same stroke.
  - justinmk 12y ago
    That strikes me as a tangent, it raises many questions (What happens if I want to work more than 20 hours a week?). The idea of a "work week" is based on the salary model which is based on the idea that companies are magical job fairies that exist to provide jobs. What if I create a product and work on it more than 20 hours? What if I want to sell peanut butter at the local food market on the weekends?
    - myelin 12y ago
      In practice, an "X hour work week" means employers are required to pay a multiple of the usual wage for hours worked past X. So you can allow/require employees to work longer, but it'll be cheaper to employ more people for fewer hours.
      - icebraining 12y ago
        Which just leads to people having to get multiple jobs, with the added stress and commuting it brings.
    - santaclaus 12y ago
      > (What happens if I want to work more than 20 hours a week?) I have friends in France who sneak into their academic research labs after hours because of this exact reason (well, not 20 hours, but set max work hours)... seems super silly to me.
      - rewqfdsa 12y ago
        There has to be a mechanism for people who are truly passionate about their work, like artists, scientists, programmers, to follow their passions as far as they want. The danger, of course, is that intra-organization competition pressures people to work longer and longer hours. I'm willing to accept that risk so long as we make a shorter work week the default. We're talking about an unusual case, though. You have to realize the most people hate their jobs. They're not following their passions. They find work tedious, uncomfortable, and frequently demeaning. For these people, the bulk of humanity, a cap on working hours frees them to do something they find much more interesting.
        icebraining 12y ago
        It most likely frees them to go to their second job, now that their salary has been cut proportionally to the fewer hours worked.
    - e12e 12y ago
      This obsession with hours might be the root of the problem. Most businesses have given up trying to measure produced value per worker (and certainly don't reward based on value produced). The 40 hour work week just means that it is expected that you work 40 hours a week, 48 weeks a year (give or take, depending on vacation practice/laws) -- in order for the employer to pay you "full benefits". That typically includes ideas about a living wage (not in all parts of the world), and some form of social safety net, such as health care, insurance etc. A 20 hour work week, would just mean that the expected time most need to put in, to get the basic salary/coverage would be cut in half. I don't think a smooth, nor easy transition is possible -- you can look at like doubling hourly wages, or halving all prices, or through some other lens: but I think that we are getting accustomed to thinking of hourly pay, hourly wages/compensation etc is part of the problem. The idea of a work week: that one can work "full time" for one employer doesn't really say that much about how much time one puts in -- it's more about what responsibility that employer have for the employee. And the "norm" of 40 hours is used as a guide to compensate extra for overtime, or to reduce compensation for people that can't or won't work "full time". Maybe the best way forward, if one believes that some form of "fair" distribution is possible under capitalism, is to have all businesses be 100% employee owned. It's not entirely clear why anyone else should benefit directly from being able to pay less for work put in by workers, and pocket the difference. Especially considering that a lot of the capital invested might be borrowed money -- which under fractional reserve banking is just money made up out of thin air and given to those that need it the least.
      - tbrownaw 12y ago
        I'd think a better solution (that requiring full employee ownership) would be to remove as much of the per-employee cost as possible. Make health insurance not tied to employment. (It could be universal coverage handled by the government, it could be what we're half trying where everyone buys their own. As long as it's not thru the employer, it doesn't matter for this.) Make things like FMLA leave not depend on working enough hours. Remove the caps that some payroll taxes have. Some per-employee costs are unavoidable. If my team has 10 people instead of 5 people, and they're all available at different times, that's a cost. The work has to be divided differently, I have to remember more interpersonal crap, there will be communication delays, etc. But as much as possible should either be handled by Someone Else or made dependent linearly on hours or pay, rather than being tied to employment as a boolean or to a threshold number of hours or amount of pay.
gfodor 12y ago
Serious question: what's special about now, as opposed to 10 years ago or 10 years from now?
- rewqfdsa 12y ago
  I can't think of anything special about this instant, but look at prevailing conditions: the employment-to-population rate has plummeted in recent years [1]. The number of zero-margin-product people on disability has skyrocketed [2]. Income inequality has increased markedly [3]. Yet our GDP has increased tremendously during that time [4]. We just don't need as many person-hours as we used to need. The trend is only going to continue. Except in the case of people with exceptional cognitive endowments (like most of the HN readership), there's a labor glut. We could just wait. The trend will continue. Eventually, things will come to a head (or several, under a guillotine). Instead, let's gracefully adapt to increased productivity by increasing the cost of labor. That's how we can let the population as a whole benefit from this productivity miracle. [1] http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000 http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000 [2] http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/us-disability-rolls-swell-in-a-rough-economy/2013/09/20/a791915c-1575-11e3-804b-d3a1a3a18f2c_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/us-disability... [3] https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=gini+coefficient+united+statesm+2005+to+2015 https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=gini+coefficient+unite... [4] https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=United+States+real+GDP&lk=1 https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=United+States+real+GDP...
  - prostoalex 12y ago
    Your [1] begins in 2005. Expand that to maximum range, and it will turn out that we're at about average. I think one of the expected outcomes of ACA was that people who could afford to retire, but were too constrained to buy their own health insurance, would leave the workforce.
    - rewqfdsa 12y ago
      The previous period with a comparable employment-population ratio was before women entered the workforce in large numbers.
the_cat_kittles 12y ago
you can kind of do that now. of course it doesn't work for everyone's occupation as easily. you just have to decide not to care how you compare to other people. most of humanity lived with nothing!
winter_blue 12y ago
> Enact a 20-hour work week "Enact" implies the government restricting everyone to working 20 hours per week. That's a violation of our freedom to work as many hours as we want. I do support you in that all of people shouldn't have to work in order to meet the basic needs of life today (food, housing, and connectivity). Agricultural and industrial efficiency and automization has advanced to a point where we can provide these basic needs to 90% of the populace with only 10% of people maintaining/operating these machines. A lot of people will continue to work 50 or 60 hours, because a lot of humans are naturally inclined to work. They derive pleasure and satisfaction from it. I would myself personally continue working, perhaps even harder than I do now, but would direct my efforts towards things that I enjoy more, and that are potentially more impactful, meaningful, and beneficial to society. Ensuring that everyone's basic needs are met would give people great personal freedom to pursue what they want. How would we implement this? One possible way is basic income -- although it might be beneficial to incentivize productive and meaningful use of freedom that basic income gives people. We don't want a country where 50% of the population spends time watching soap operas, and eating junk food. Just some of my thoughts...
- AngrySkillzz 12y ago
  Maybe, in the same way that industrial safety regulations violate our freedom to work in whatever environment we want.
  - Karunamon 12y ago
    Working without safety regulation is harmful. Working 21 hours is not.
    - josephkern 12y ago
      Depends on what union you work for ... But heck, even pilots can work a 40 hour week (of actual flight time). I am not sure if there is even a hypothetical union that would limit work time to such a degree (<30 hours). My straw man is burning.
  - winter_blue 12y ago
jes 12y ago
In the online dictionary I consulted, dignity is defined as "The state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect." I think productive work is one means by which individuals can become more worthy of honor and respect. Thoughts?
- pjmorris 12y ago
  Are you saying that work, not people, is what is worthy of honor and respect?
  - jes 12y ago
    I'm saying that productive work is one way in which people can become more worthy of honor and respect. For example, let's say you have two individuals. One gets married, fathers some children, and then decides that rather than supporting his family, he's going to sit around and play video games while his wife works 24x7 to try to take care of the family. Another man, in the same circumstances, gets a job, works hard every day, studies things that he finds interesting, and eventually works himself into a job where he can easily support his family, to the point where the members of his family can engage in things that interest them. Which man is more worthy of honor and respect? I would say the man in the second example. Do you see it differently?
    - nostrademons 12y ago
      Not the OP, but yes, I see it differently. IMHO, it's none of my business. The division of chores between the man and his wife is between the man and his wife. The reason is because of a quirk of psychology. What you're describing is basically shaming people: making them feel like they are unworthy because of what they do or do not choose to do. And that's a logical response to trying to influence behavior. Except it doesn't work. When you, me, society in general makes people feel like they're unworthy of honor and respect because of what they do, they end up confirming those expectations of unworthiness in what they do, they don't end up adjusting what they do to escape your judgments.
      - 12y ago
tbrownaw 12y ago
Unused and less-used skills deteriorate over time. For skilled professions, how much time practicing is needed to counteract this? Technology is changing very rapidly. As a software developer, I need to put in some amount of time keeping up with the changes. Someone specifically focused on web stuff would probably need to put in even more time keeping up. Lawyers will have to keep with new laws, and case law. I understand it's typical for licensed professions to require members to have ongoing education in order to keep their licenses. How much time keeping up is needed to stay current? If you try to force a 20-hour work week, what do you do when people try to evade this by taking multiple jobs? What do you do about independent business owners who only employ themselves?
mahyarm 12y ago
That only works if the fixed costs of a worker (benefits) are negligible at best. If employers need to keep on paying for health care, then it's always cheaper to overwork a worker unless the overtime makes it more expensive. So you need govt. health care for one to get rid of a fixed cost of employees before it becomes feasible for companies. Also a single worker can produce more work until exhaustion effects start kicking in than a single worker. That equilibrium is probably around 40hrs. Communication and management overhead alone adds more fixed cost to adding an employee. But if you look at the charts of average work weeks, you'll notice that they are going down. In parts of europe, a full time worker is becoming something between 30-40 hrs.
- greggman 12y ago
  How does gov health care change this? I pay $500 a year to health ins or $500 a year more in taxes. Either way I pay $500 a year. That's not an argument for or against gov health care I'm just asking for clarification why it matters for your point
  - mahyarm 12y ago
    Because it's based on a tax % rate vs a fixed cost of $2-5k/yr per employee. So if you want to hire 4 people for 10hrs/wk paying each of them $20/hr instead of 1 person at 40hrs/wk, it's not going to cost the company an extra $6-15k / yr to get equivalent hours of labor to do so. You need to reduce fixed costs and make them a cost that scales with the amount paid for the labor to make doing this more attractive for companies. Other benefits are pretty much nothing compared to health insurance, or only cost money when the employees are at the job site, so govt. healthcare is needed before 4 workers at 10 hours a week becomes more attractive to employers. Walmart & co make their employees work part time just to avoid paying mandatory benefits. Benefits are a big cost to companies.
prostoalex 12y ago
They already have, more or less, with ACA coverage provisions. Old article, but "Along with more workers clocking just below 30 hours in their primary jobs, CPS data show the number working 20-29 hours in secondary jobs rose 105,000, or 7.6%, from a year ago. Other Labor Department data also suggest an ObamaCare effect. The average retail workweek for nonsupervisors shrank to a three-year low of 30 hours in July, down from a post-recession peak of 30.8 hours in January 2012. That's the sharpest decline in the retail workweek since the early 1980s." http://news.investors.com/080513-666340-obamacare-cuts-part-time-jobs-below-30-hours-data-show.htm http://news.investors.com/080513-666340-obamacare-cuts-part-...

justinmk 12y ago

Humans want services from other humans. If humans aren't willing or able to pay other humans to do things, something is preventing that. Anything that can be provided by machines at negligible cost becomes a "general condition" (like air), so it isn't relevant to scarcity. If something is still scarce after that, it means some human labor is needed to provide it (or a bad actor is preventing it--e.g., labor laws or whatever).

rewqfdsa 12y ago
But I'm not sure what point you're making. If market forces can operate in a world with a 40 hour default work week, they can operate in a world with a 20 hour work week. At the macroeconomic level, we're talking about tweaking a coefficient. So what? By shortening the work week, we can give many more people an opportunity to engage in dignified work, give them more leisure time, and spur further investment in labor-saving machinery, all in the same stroke.
- justinmk 12y ago
  That strikes me as a tangent, it raises many questions (What happens if I want to work more than 20 hours a week?). The idea of a "work week" is based on the salary model which is based on the idea that companies are magical job fairies that exist to provide jobs. What if I create a product and work on it more than 20 hours? What if I want to sell peanut butter at the local food market on the weekends?
  - myelin 12y ago
    In practice, an "X hour work week" means employers are required to pay a multiple of the usual wage for hours worked past X. So you can allow/require employees to work longer, but it'll be cheaper to employ more people for fewer hours.
    - icebraining 12y ago
      Which just leads to people having to get multiple jobs, with the added stress and commuting it brings.
  - santaclaus 12y ago
    > (What happens if I want to work more than 20 hours a week?) I have friends in France who sneak into their academic research labs after hours because of this exact reason (well, not 20 hours, but set max work hours)... seems super silly to me.
    - rewqfdsa 12y ago
      There has to be a mechanism for people who are truly passionate about their work, like artists, scientists, programmers, to follow their passions as far as they want. The danger, of course, is that intra-organization competition pressures people to work longer and longer hours. I'm willing to accept that risk so long as we make a shorter work week the default. We're talking about an unusual case, though. You have to realize the most people hate their jobs. They're not following their passions. They find work tedious, uncomfortable, and frequently demeaning. For these people, the bulk of humanity, a cap on working hours frees them to do something they find much more interesting.
      - icebraining 12y ago
        It most likely frees them to go to their second job, now that their salary has been cut proportionally to the fewer hours worked.
  - e12e 12y ago
    This obsession with hours might be the root of the problem. Most businesses have given up trying to measure produced value per worker (and certainly don't reward based on value produced). The 40 hour work week just means that it is expected that you work 40 hours a week, 48 weeks a year (give or take, depending on vacation practice/laws) -- in order for the employer to pay you "full benefits". That typically includes ideas about a living wage (not in all parts of the world), and some form of social safety net, such as health care, insurance etc. A 20 hour work week, would just mean that the expected time most need to put in, to get the basic salary/coverage would be cut in half. I don't think a smooth, nor easy transition is possible -- you can look at like doubling hourly wages, or halving all prices, or through some other lens: but I think that we are getting accustomed to thinking of hourly pay, hourly wages/compensation etc is part of the problem. The idea of a work week: that one can work "full time" for one employer doesn't really say that much about how much time one puts in -- it's more about what responsibility that employer have for the employee. And the "norm" of 40 hours is used as a guide to compensate extra for overtime, or to reduce compensation for people that can't or won't work "full time". Maybe the best way forward, if one believes that some form of "fair" distribution is possible under capitalism, is to have all businesses be 100% employee owned. It's not entirely clear why anyone else should benefit directly from being able to pay less for work put in by workers, and pocket the difference. Especially considering that a lot of the capital invested might be borrowed money -- which under fractional reserve banking is just money made up out of thin air and given to those that need it the least.
    - tbrownaw 12y ago
      I'd think a better solution (that requiring full employee ownership) would be to remove as much of the per-employee cost as possible. Make health insurance not tied to employment. (It could be universal coverage handled by the government, it could be what we're half trying where everyone buys their own. As long as it's not thru the employer, it doesn't matter for this.) Make things like FMLA leave not depend on working enough hours. Remove the caps that some payroll taxes have. Some per-employee costs are unavoidable. If my team has 10 people instead of 5 people, and they're all available at different times, that's a cost. The work has to be divided differently, I have to remember more interpersonal crap, there will be communication delays, etc. But as much as possible should either be handled by Someone Else or made dependent linearly on hours or pay, rather than being tied to employment as a boolean or to a threshold number of hours or amount of pay.

gfodor 12y ago

Serious question: what's special about now, as opposed to 10 years ago or 10 years from now?

rewqfdsa 12y ago
I can't think of anything special about this instant, but look at prevailing conditions: the employment-to-population rate has plummeted in recent years [1]. The number of zero-margin-product people on disability has skyrocketed [2]. Income inequality has increased markedly [3]. Yet our GDP has increased tremendously during that time [4]. We just don't need as many person-hours as we used to need. The trend is only going to continue. Except in the case of people with exceptional cognitive endowments (like most of the HN readership), there's a labor glut. We could just wait. The trend will continue. Eventually, things will come to a head (or several, under a guillotine). Instead, let's gracefully adapt to increased productivity by increasing the cost of labor. That's how we can let the population as a whole benefit from this productivity miracle. [1] http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000 http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000 [2] http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/us-disability-rolls-swell-in-a-rough-economy/2013/09/20/a791915c-1575-11e3-804b-d3a1a3a18f2c_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/us-disability... [3] https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=gini+coefficient+united+statesm+2005+to+2015 https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=gini+coefficient+unite... [4] https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=United+States+real+GDP&lk=1 https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=United+States+real+GDP...
- prostoalex 12y ago
  Your [1] begins in 2005. Expand that to maximum range, and it will turn out that we're at about average. I think one of the expected outcomes of ACA was that people who could afford to retire, but were too constrained to buy their own health insurance, would leave the workforce.
  - rewqfdsa 12y ago
    The previous period with a comparable employment-population ratio was before women entered the workforce in large numbers.

the_cat_kittles 12y ago

you can kind of do that now. of course it doesn't work for everyone's occupation as easily. you just have to decide not to care how you compare to other people. most of humanity lived with nothing!

winter_blue 12y ago

> Enact a 20-hour work week "Enact" implies the government restricting everyone to working 20 hours per week. That's a violation of our freedom to work as many hours as we want. I do support you in that all of people shouldn't have to work in order to meet the basic needs of life today (food, housing, and connectivity). Agricultural and industrial efficiency and automization has advanced to a point where we can provide these basic needs to 90% of the populace with only 10% of people maintaining/operating these machines. A lot of people will continue to work 50 or 60 hours, because a lot of humans are naturally inclined to work. They derive pleasure and satisfaction from it. I would myself personally continue working, perhaps even harder than I do now, but would direct my efforts towards things that I enjoy more, and that are potentially more impactful, meaningful, and beneficial to society. Ensuring that everyone's basic needs are met would give people great personal freedom to pursue what they want. How would we implement this? One possible way is basic income -- although it might be beneficial to incentivize productive and meaningful use of freedom that basic income gives people. We don't want a country where 50% of the population spends time watching soap operas, and eating junk food. Just some of my thoughts...

AngrySkillzz 12y ago
Maybe, in the same way that industrial safety regulations violate our freedom to work in whatever environment we want.
- Karunamon 12y ago
  Working without safety regulation is harmful. Working 21 hours is not.
  - josephkern 12y ago
    Depends on what union you work for ... But heck, even pilots can work a 40 hour week (of actual flight time). I am not sure if there is even a hypothetical union that would limit work time to such a degree (<30 hours). My straw man is burning.
- winter_blue 12y ago

jes 12y ago

In the online dictionary I consulted, dignity is defined as "The state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect." I think productive work is one means by which individuals can become more worthy of honor and respect. Thoughts?

pjmorris 12y ago
Are you saying that work, not people, is what is worthy of honor and respect?
- jes 12y ago
  I'm saying that productive work is one way in which people can become more worthy of honor and respect. For example, let's say you have two individuals. One gets married, fathers some children, and then decides that rather than supporting his family, he's going to sit around and play video games while his wife works 24x7 to try to take care of the family. Another man, in the same circumstances, gets a job, works hard every day, studies things that he finds interesting, and eventually works himself into a job where he can easily support his family, to the point where the members of his family can engage in things that interest them. Which man is more worthy of honor and respect? I would say the man in the second example. Do you see it differently?
  - nostrademons 12y ago
    Not the OP, but yes, I see it differently. IMHO, it's none of my business. The division of chores between the man and his wife is between the man and his wife. The reason is because of a quirk of psychology. What you're describing is basically shaming people: making them feel like they are unworthy because of what they do or do not choose to do. And that's a logical response to trying to influence behavior. Except it doesn't work. When you, me, society in general makes people feel like they're unworthy of honor and respect because of what they do, they end up confirming those expectations of unworthiness in what they do, they don't end up adjusting what they do to escape your judgments.
    - 12y ago

tbrownaw 12y ago

Unused and less-used skills deteriorate over time. For skilled professions, how much time practicing is needed to counteract this? Technology is changing very rapidly. As a software developer, I need to put in some amount of time keeping up with the changes. Someone specifically focused on web stuff would probably need to put in even more time keeping up. Lawyers will have to keep with new laws, and case law. I understand it's typical for licensed professions to require members to have ongoing education in order to keep their licenses. How much time keeping up is needed to stay current? If you try to force a 20-hour work week, what do you do when people try to evade this by taking multiple jobs? What do you do about independent business owners who only employ themselves?

mahyarm 12y ago

That only works if the fixed costs of a worker (benefits) are negligible at best. If employers need to keep on paying for health care, then it's always cheaper to overwork a worker unless the overtime makes it more expensive. So you need govt. health care for one to get rid of a fixed cost of employees before it becomes feasible for companies. Also a single worker can produce more work until exhaustion effects start kicking in than a single worker. That equilibrium is probably around 40hrs. Communication and management overhead alone adds more fixed cost to adding an employee. But if you look at the charts of average work weeks, you'll notice that they are going down. In parts of europe, a full time worker is becoming something between 30-40 hrs.

greggman 12y ago
How does gov health care change this? I pay $500 a year to health ins or $500 a year more in taxes. Either way I pay $500 a year. That's not an argument for or against gov health care I'm just asking for clarification why it matters for your point
- mahyarm 12y ago
  Because it's based on a tax % rate vs a fixed cost of $2-5k/yr per employee. So if you want to hire 4 people for 10hrs/wk paying each of them $20/hr instead of 1 person at 40hrs/wk, it's not going to cost the company an extra $6-15k / yr to get equivalent hours of labor to do so. You need to reduce fixed costs and make them a cost that scales with the amount paid for the labor to make doing this more attractive for companies. Other benefits are pretty much nothing compared to health insurance, or only cost money when the employees are at the job site, so govt. healthcare is needed before 4 workers at 10 hours a week becomes more attractive to employers. Walmart & co make their employees work part time just to avoid paying mandatory benefits. Benefits are a big cost to companies.

prostoalex 12y ago

They already have, more or less, with ACA coverage provisions. Old article, but "Along with more workers clocking just below 30 hours in their primary jobs, CPS data show the number working 20-29 hours in secondary jobs rose 105,000, or 7.6%, from a year ago. Other Labor Department data also suggest an ObamaCare effect. The average retail workweek for nonsupervisors shrank to a three-year low of 30 hours in July, down from a post-recession peak of 30.8 hours in January 2012. That's the sharpest decline in the retail workweek since the early 1980s." http://news.investors.com/080513-666340-obamacare-cuts-part-time-jobs-below-30-hours-data-show.htm http://news.investors.com/080513-666340-obamacare-cuts-part-...