The death of the 40-hour workweek

CNN ^ | April 30, 2015 | CNN

[Dallas59]

When you're hired for a full-time job, the understanding is that you'll put in at least a 40-hour workweek.

The expectation -- especially for salaried employees who don't qualify for overtime -- is that you'll put in more to ensure your projects get done.

Or because the boss needs something at the last minute.

[logi_cal869]

You are correct as to that minority of workers and the lowest end of the wage scale.

But, to be clear...I do not classify ‘bench techs’ to be ‘Information Technology’ workers.

Tom-ay-to/Tom-ah-to, perhaps, but my take based on experience.

[logi_cal869]

One more reason to abolish the IRS (as that cliche’ goes)...

[jaydee770]

Another thing I see is the ridiculous amount of bureaucracy in both the govt, edu, mil and commercial sectors. Doesn’t matter who/where, there is a crap-ton of waste due to shuffling unnecessary paperwork.

Either through govt regulation or spineless CYA policies, when you attempt to mitigate any and all risk, you will drown yourself in paperwork doing it and in the process handicap each and every worker’s productivity.

Of course, another point of view is that it’s not the managers/CEOs/Directors driving it, it’s the lawyers. It’s lawyers pursuing any & every lawsuit imaginable and lawyers in legislative houses setting the stage for those lawsuits.

[logi_cal869]

Work to live.

not

Live to work...

Painful lesson learned the hard way after ignoring very good advice long ago.

[Yardstick]

Yeah, that’s pretty much my perspective too. I think 40 hours is a nice guideline but there’s no cosmic law of social justice that says people should only have to work 40 hours. I usually work between 40 and 50 but if a project requires more I’ll work more and I won’t complain about doing so.

[IronJack]

The part of IT that kills me is “off-hours support,” also known as “on-call.”. You are effectively on the clock, accountable to the company for all your behavior, subject to all their rules and regulations, and liable to be interrupted in your private life on a moment’s notice, but you don’t get paid for it.

And then companies have the nerve to tell employees not to bring their problems to work. The companies sure have no problem insisting you take THEIR problems home with you.

[logi_cal869]

Hence my appropriate use of the term ‘sweat-shop’.

Been there, done that and have friends killing themselves, partly trapped in their careers.

Politicians will support worker visas (Cruz, among them) but no one EVER mentions changing the labor laws to effectively eliminate the ‘exemption’ I’ve highlighted in this thread...

[IronJack]

IT architecture is a good route to the top of the mountain. Get TOGAF certified. Then go for an App Architect role, a Solution Architect, and finally an Enterprise position. From there, at your age, CIO — the summit — is within reach.

[trebb]

I'm retired now but I was one of those "Civil Service leeches" that averaged 50 hrs a week to do the job and the additional duties. 24 years in uniform taught me that there are easy times when one can relax a bit and then there are times when the natural response is to dig in and git 'er dun" - I could never shake that once I became a "civilian" and the mission was the focus.

While in uniform, there were some really easy times when we could "let our hair down" and then there were times and assignments that required one to dig a bit deeper. The year I spent in Korea, I think I had about 3 weekends totally off and the rest were at least a Saturday and also a number of Sundays.

I will concede that many businesses abuse the "salaried positions" to screw some employees - "salaried" should have a fair wage attached instead of how some poor schmucks making $30K/year and working 50-60 hour weeks.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

Nothing new. We were taught in high school (1960-1964) that in the future the work week would be 30-35 hours because of the increase in population.
In my life, the average work week was 48 hours a week, often more!

[Gandalf_The_Gray]

The expectation -- especially for salaried employees who don't qualify for overtime -- is that you'll put in more to ensure your projects get done.

Or because the boss needs something at the last minute.

I was a senior design engineer who doubled as the CAD system manager for my employer. I spent my weekends running system backups and installing software updates. I did this mainly because I found it fun and enjoyed the time on the system by myself.

Regards,
GtG

PS I retired at age 53 w/ a golden parachute...Not all rewards come in timely manner!

PPS Employer was Robert Bosch Gmbh, 630,000 employees world wide!

[tbw2]

I’ve worked where being on call for a day was equal to one hour for every eight on call. But try that on a day off, and you lose out on activities because you can’t go to the amusement park or go anywhere but a fifteen minute run to the store.
You’re able to stay at home, but even that has limits.

[tbw2]

The problem is employers who demand ten hours overtime from a team of four so they don’t have to hire a fifth.

[Oatka]

I was a programmer during the ‘70s-’90s, the last 10 as an hourly-paid contract programmer. On those rare occasions when I worked overtime, I was paid straight-time, and never griped because the rate was so high.

I was talking with a new-hire (contractor) who told me this gem - one I suspect others can vouch for.

The interviewer told the Newbie contractor that they didn’t like clock-watchers, that programmers were expected to work extra hours, etc., etc.

The Newbie said that was OK, he was willing to work holidays and weekends. The interviewer’s face paled at a sudden revelation. “You are a contractor!” he blurted out, as if it was an epithet. Newbie says “Yup”.

Newbie reported the interviewer nearly pulled a muscle doing a flip-flop, “Oh, well, you’ll have to get authorization from you team leader before working any overtime. You just can’t do it on your own.”

[discostu]

Smart companies are figuring this out. Lots of overtime reduces productive, and increases turn over. Where I’m at we never do OT, “team building” (some deathmatch video game or other) starts a little after 4 and the work day is done, play or go home. I go home. We get a lot done, we ship on time, and we get to enjoy our non-work lives.

[IronJack]

When you figure that for your on-call stretch, you're on the company's clock 24X7 with no pay, it starts making your compensation look pretty McPoor. Instead of a standard 2000-hour year, if you work one week on-call every month, that's 2 24-hour days of unpaid labor plus 5 16-hour days, for a total of 1536 hours every year you work for nothing. Now divide your salary by 2000 (your standard work year) + 1536 (your giveaway time) and see how much you're making per hour.

Why that is not illegal is beyond me.

[caww]

When I was working full time there were several who stayed way beyond their time....even though there wasn't any work for them to do since the shift has changed. It's called “stealing” from the employer when you don't need to be there. And remarkably there are more people doing that then most employers realize.

[caww]

Just wait until your retired...you’ll wonder how you got it all done before!

[tbw2]

I am not on call all the time, but have sometimes taken shifts of being on call.

At least for me, being a parent allowed me to say “no” to on call expectations in IT. Not responding to a call because I was at the grocery store was a point of contention. Not responding to a call because my son landed in the ER, we debated the lack of hand-off processes he had because they just scheduled me for that holiday week, no one was answering the phone when I said I can’t do this, and kids can get sick over Christmas break.
But it does mess things up to say “I can’t leave the house”, since I don’t want to take devices with me on the road or to others’ homes.

[exnavy]

I’ve heard it is like that. I can’t wait to give it a try.