| > The point is that if you worked 50 vs 35 hours at the same job, you'd simply get more done -
> even considering diminishing returns. Not to the best of my knowledge. It is worth remembering that the 40 hour workweek was introduced by Henry Ford in 1926 not because he was a bleeding heart liberal, but in order to increase productivity. More hours don't necessarily equal more work done. [1] For modern non-mechanical jobs, the maximum productivity threshold may be even lower. For some types of jobs, productivity can even decrease: after a certain point, programmers will write sloppier code with more defects; the additional LOCs don't help because you're now creating additional work to remove these defects. That doesn't mean that there aren't exceptions; just like there are people who have a natural talent to identify prime numbers, there are people who can sustain a high level of productivity over a large number of hours worked. I also note that corporate leaders operate under different constraints: for them, availability may matter more than personal productivity. Unrelated to productivity is the health issue: Consistently working long hours is bad for your health in a number of ways [2,3]. [1] http://www.salon.com/2012/03/14/bring_back_the_40_hour_work_... [2] http://edition.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/04/04/long.work.hours.hea... [3] http://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/25/health/working-overtime-do... |