A widely shared definition of “freedom” is tough to agree upon, but until the 1930s, a broad group of Americans, from poets and architects to business owners and conservative politicians, shared a vision that capitalism would deliver on the hazy idea in a very concrete way: more and more leisure time for all.
In their view, economic progress would carve a path from the grueling factories of the Industrial Revolution to a not-so-distant future largely free from work. As the British economist John Maynard Keynes put it in 1930, “for the first time since his creation man will be faced with his real, his permanent problem — how to use his freedom from pressing economic cares, how to occupy the leisure which science and compound interest will have won for him.”
more free time died with the rest of the ‘american dream’
maybe if billionaires werent allowed to exist. if the incredibly faked stock market wasnt the financial lynch-pin holding all this bullshit together… if it wasnt profit over everything else… maybe… but its not.
If I had more vacation time I’d just spend it playing video games and watching TV because vacations are prohibitively expensive.
I’m an XRay Tech in a hospital. I LOVE my 3, 12 hour days! It’s only an extra 4 hours each day. Then I have 4 day weekends, EVERY WEEK! It’s amazing! I could never go back to 5 day work weeks.
Let’s make that 3 x 12 hour week into a 3 x 8 hour week - that’s what the article is suggesting we should think more about. Because 36 hours is basically a full work week condensed into three days - a 4 day work week refers to 4 days of 8 hours of work (32 hours per week), and the article wants to go further than that by pointing to the productivity gains we’ve made. Here are the top countries by least hours worked per week:
- Netherlands - 30.4
- Denmark - 33.4
- Norway - 33.8
- Germany - 34.5
- Finland - 35
- Austria - 35.1
- Belgium - 35.2
- Iceland - 35.5
- Ireland - 35.6
- Switzerland - 35.7
And remember, averages are skewed meaning that most people could be working less than the average. These countries are able to stay comfortably afloat despite their shorter workweeks.
When we’re talking about productivity there are so many cool things we can do: unions increase productivity, 4 day work weeks increases productivity, public/free healthcare increases productivity, fast public transportation increases productivity… all these low hanging fruits that can increase our labor output per hour - they’re not radical scientific advancements, they’re boring things we can do right now if we put in the resources to achieve them.
When I worked EMS I did 7 days/80 hours/7 days off. A lot of people hated it but I loved it. Worked 80 hours (plus some for OT getting held over for calls) in 7 days, then had the next 7 days off. Rotated every 2 weeks. By the 7th day I’d be tired and ready to be done, but it really wasn’t too terrible. I worked 2 8 hour shifts, 4 12 hour shifts, and finished with a 16 hour shift. Usually picked up 2-10 hours of OT on average every rotation from getting dispatched out on 911 calls at the end of the day before relief showed up, which always was an annoying end to the day, or from taking early 911 calls for the previous shift if I was there early so that they didn’t have to stay over. I also got 160 hours combined PTO/sick to start, so every year I’d burn 80 of those hours on a 7 day rotation and end up with a 3 week chunk of time away from work. Heaven for an American wage slave like myself.
Yep, did that for years, had four full weeks of vacations + chose when I would have my days off for the 13 holidays but they were all paid 8h/day, I still took the hit on my paycheck to have 10 weeks of vacation a year!
I work a 2-2-3 schedule, 2 days on, 2 off, 3 on, then the next week it reverses, so on average I work 3½ days/week.
Now granted I do work 12 hour days, which isn’t for everyone or every job, but overall I love this schedule.
I have days off during the week which is really convenient for running errands.
I never work more than 3 days in a row without a 2 or 3 day break.
Every other weekend is a 3 day weekend
If I plan my vacations accordingly I only need to take off 2 days to get a whole week off.
I actually kind of struggle to use up my vacation time every year because 90% of everything I’d want to do can be squeezed into my schedule with little to no adjustment.
Also my personal schedule is 3pm-3am, which again isn’t for everyone, but I love it. There’s basically never any significant traffic during my commute, and it’s basically the schedule we all sort of wanted when we were teens and 20-somethings- sleep in until noon, and go home after the bars kick you out. It’s not as bad as a regular night shift where you have to totally turn your schedule on it’s head to do stuff during the morning/daytime,
The biggest bummer about it is when your friends end up working the exact opposite shift because you never get to see them.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
As the British economist John Maynard Keynes put it in 1930, “for the first time since his creation man will be faced with his real, his permanent problem — how to use his freedom from pressing economic cares, how to occupy the leisure which science and compound interest will have won for him.”
In the glory days of the American labor movement, when unions were strong and wages rose alongside productivity, “organized workers could cash that out as more free time,” said Aaron Benanav, a professor of sociology at Syracuse University and author of Automation and the Future of Work.
Before the 40-hour week was law, Henry Ford implemented one in his factories in the 1920s to prevent exhaustion among his assembly line workers and open up more time for consumption and travel, while still paying enough to help grow the middle class he needed to purchase his cars.
One analysis made the case that reducing working hours could also help lower carbon emissions by cutting electricity use, commutes, and household consumption in the UK, a connection growing in popularity among advocates.
By providing a baseline of resources unconditionally — that is, to all citizens, whether or not they’re employed — people gain what the economist Albert Hirschman called an “exit option.” Not just the freedom to choose their flavor of misery, but the real possibility of saying no.
Some scholars believe that peasants of the late medieval period enjoyed more leisure time than today’s average American worker, largely because about half of the calendar year was occupied with festivals and celebrations.
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