[qw]

I guess it depends on what work you do. If I worked a 100% of the day, except for lunch break, my brain would be fried after a few days. 5 minutes an hour doing something else actually makes me more productive.

Sure, when I'm in the zone and are lucky enough not to get interrupted I can program for longer periods of time, but I still need a short break now and then.

I don't know where you worked, and since I'm from a different country, the standards may also be different. But where I live, I can't think of a physical job where you are required to work at 100% capacity for a whole day, except for a lunch break. Short rest periods are required.

[jheriko]

5 minute breaks are effective for refreshing yourself and I do the very same probably about once an hour but this is a luxury of my workplace and is generally not allowed in manual work - in some situations - e.g. assembly line, it is crucial that no one take breaks for very long - asking to go to the toilet can get you fired (I've had this happen to the guy working right next to me once). I think we've probably tested methods to "perfection" over the last 5k years or so. This is part of why there is an invisible barrier between office and shop floor so often - because office guys get a lot of slack and have easier jobs by many measures. Just being allowed to sit whilst you work can seem like an incredible luxury to some of these guys stuck standing at an assembly line or running around a warehouse filling orders. And I'm sorry, but I'm a programmer - you can train someone to be a programmer, and most office type jobs on the fly just as easily as an assembly line worker - they won't be great but neither is the assembly line worker when he starts out - in both cases it takes years of practice. The difference, to me at least, seems to be artificially imposed by a combination of broken supply/demand models and general misconceptions - programmers are in huge supply, we just pretend they aren't. Most people rely on programming skills in everyday life - they just aren't told it that way.

I live in the UK there are two standard formats for most grunt work - either 2 hrs work 15 mins break 2hrs work 1hr break UNPAID (i suspect not allowed - i think this depends on a legal loophole against the spirit of the law) 2hrs work 15 mins break 2hrs work - or 8 hours with just 30 minutes paid break to be taken in one consecutive lump. i've worked both - its still nothing compared to what most of the world (i.e. China, India and Africa) deal with. I'm one of the very most privileged...

Whilst you work discipline can be illegally strict because it is accepted and nobody questions things if "80% of places I worked were like this - they can't all be illegal" or "its been this way for years" or "big companies know better than to break the law" etc. I'm one of the fortunates with sufficient balls to stand up for myself - even then I don't do it every time that I probably should, but I've seen so many people (the vast majority) treated illegally because it is accepted by their peers, and they just tolerate it. When you explain how they can protect themselves they don't want to because they need the money and don't want to tick anyone off, job security really matters when people tell you you are unskilled and jobs are hard to find - it doesn't matter how many times I tell them I've never been fired for standing up for myself.

Its one of my personal pet peeves - hence the irrationally strong response to, at best, a vaguely related link.