Major 4-day workweek study suggests that when we work 5 days we spend one doing basically nothing

Pfft. One
- “This reply was sent during work hours.”
  
  Hehe
- I barely spend a workweek doing a day's worth of work, let alone 4.
- Right?! Those are some rookie numbers
- "Those are rookie numbers! You gotta pump these numbers up!"

Maybe at a cushy white collar office job. I work at a hospital. There is no down time when you are on the clock, that’s true for nurses, doctors, housekeeping, pharmacy, lab, food service - I’d imagine the same is also true for all sort of service industry workers, and also factory workers, farmers, construction, and so so many others. Let’s stop pretending that everyone just sits in front of a computer all day.
- Whats sad is that most of those jobs are just insanely and intentionally understaffed (and underpaid), which is precisely why they're so demanding.
  
  It's almost like we should have started investing in better education and replacing manually repetitive tasks with automation.
  Machines should have been a relief from the hardship of life, not a mean to gain more profit for a few individuals.
- Those are the first jobs we need to change into 4 hours for 3 days shifts or something. It's dangerous for everyone to work without sufficient recovery
  
  Exactly. I definitely would not want a nurse or a doctor to operate on me when there on the last stretches of a 12 hour shift, running on 5 hours of sleep. The only question I ask any doctor, nurse or dentist before they start any procedure on me is "how many hours of sleep did you get last night"... Anything less than 6-7 hours puts me in more risk than I'd accept!
- It's criminal how you are all treated because of purposeful under-staffing. Everyone needs downtime. The human mind does not go full throttle for 8-12 hours straight, and I'm well aware you often have longer shifts than that in a hospital! If medical staff had some downtime during their shifts, patient outcomes would improve, and not just by a little bit.
  
  We need to mandate a certain level of staffing so this shit stops.
- I just posted the same thing. I used to be a bartender/ server and work in retail. You DON'T rest. Not on your own schedule at least
  My work is hybrid these days and I have tasks to complete instead of just drink from the firehose of task garbage being thrown my way. I can control the ebb and flow of my workday and slack or be a champion as needed.
  Oh, I work 4 9 hour day weeks too. My quality of life is better in every way and i STILL dick around certain days. You probably make a lot more than I do but it's not worth it to get home and have zero bandwidth
- It would be better if you were 4 days instead of 5. You'd have better productivity and recovery.
- I'm a doctor and intentionally set my own hours to four day work weeks whenever I can, because I run my own practice and can do that. Let's not pretend it's a badge of honour to grind ourselves into a twitching mess.
- This is exactly my problem as well... We wanted to try a 4 day work week at my factory but they said no because we need to ship things 5 days a week... Except for the fact that we almost never ship more than 1 or 2 things in any given day and they are rarely things that need to go asap... One day wouldn't kill them but they're stuck in the past.
- To be fair, for those jobs the 5 day workweek, as it is known traditionally, has never been true. They were always either doing starnge shifts like 24 hours twice then 2 free days, repeat or working way more than 5 days a week, based on demand (which of course has been increasing since businesses hire less and less for some fuckin reason).
- I assure you that "sitting in front of a computer" is less ideal than you seem to think it is
  
  Well, it's kinda depressing when you conclude no particular task for a day, yet still feel boiled due to tired eyes, headache etc.
- You're a human being, not a human doing. You need and deserve downtime. You are not a machine. You must find a way. If there's a will, there's a way.
- I work five days in a warehouse. If I go more than five minutes without scanning a box then it alerts the manager and they'll come down and see what's occurring.
  So yeah. I feel like this stat is more for office sorts who (and I may be wrong here) spend a lot of time on Reddit and Facebook during the work day.
- Obviously white collar workers need help.
  
  Can't we agree that everyone's job is difficult in one way or another instead of making it a dick-measuring contest?
  Everyone deserves a job that doesn't make them want to die as well as to make enough money to live off.

I feel like this is something that everyone already knew but we had to do a study to prove it
- People have known it since at least 1999 when Office Space was released. If you're not slacking off at work, especially if you're salaried, you're being exploited even more than usual.
  
  What would you say… you do here?

How is this a surprise? The detachment people have from the reality “on the ground” is infuriating. Try working a job you hate for shit pay for 71% of your entire fucking week and then just bounce into a weekend (assuming you even get two days off in a row) with all the energy to “do stuff”.
ffs. Assholes.
- I've put my foot down on Tuesday/Wednesday as my weekend. the past year I'd be lucky to get 2 in a row.
  This gives me a functional 4 day week but if I get rostered on Sunday I'm perfectly happy with that kind of money.
  
  I’m glad for you!! That’s great. I’m fortunate as well. I work 4 days (10 hours) so I typically have three days off and my boss usually gives me at least two in a row.
  Even with that, I still often burn one day off just recovering. This oligarchy late stage capitalism is bullshit.

That’s besides the point. You have to be there so you don’t have enough time to achieve your hopes & dreams, ensuring you don’t build up any wealth, let alone generational wealth, and therefore can never challenge their dominance & authority.
- It's highly unlikely that any of my dreams would make me wealthy, because they all involve having fun, improving myself, and/or making the world a better place. I think most other people are the same way.
- I agree, this is more than whether we work more or less efficiently with 4 or 5 days in the office. The ruling class wants us in our white cages (office walls) for as long as possible so, as you said, they can ensure we can't work on other stuff that truly satisfies us and gives us a chance of generating actual wealth rather than depending on whatever measly income they want us to live paycheck to paycheck on...
- I'm pretty convinced these days that generational wealth as a goal leads to exactly this problem. Not that I disagree that we could be using that time in more fulfilling ways, but generational wealth as a construct probably inherently means significant inequality, unless it's some utopian wealth where it's equally shared.
  
  Indeed. The solution for the problems caused by nobility isn't to make more nobles, even if that noble is oneself.
  
  There needs to be a cap of some kind. I don't want my kids to end up like Musk where they're fucking idiots with millions.

A five day work week gives your employer more control over your life though. They will not give that up willingly.
- That's why my main goal is to accumulate 'fuck you money'. Right now, I get my tasks done asap and gtfo and if they don't like that, they can fire me if they'd like. If they don't like that all my work flow is smooth and efficient but I leave early or come in late, they can frankly fuck right off... So far I got 5 years worth of living expenses stashed away (my fuck you money stash) but I'm trying to put it in places that it can generate me income in alternative ways so I can flip the script on them and remove any remaining leverage they have on me.

we spend one doing basically nothing
Browsing Lemmy is not doing nothing. I'm , um, keeping my head in tune with the global marketplace and honing my remote interpersonal skillset. Yeah, that's what it is.
- I'm just looking at cats.

Office Space knew this all the way back in 1999.
I'd say in a given week I probably only do about fifteen minutes of real, actual, work
- They knew this in the 70's along with ubi. Milton Friedman is an asshole.
  
  My dream is a 4day/20hour week with 30 days paid leave and a monthly UBI along with free healthcare and free education and universities.
  People would struggle so much less this way.
  The craziest thing is that economically and resource wise, it's perfectly doable.
- Wow 15 minutes of work for 40 hours of pay. That's truly inspiring and impressive. 😌👌

Only one day? You guys are slacking.
- Yeah I'm hovering at atleast 3 days of nothing, trying to push it to 4..
- Of course, Slack is part of the workflow ;P

Yeah no shit lol. On my last job which gave you about as much power as a 3 year old, I got real good with making it look like I was doing work.
Most businesses think “process” is critical but all process did was make me do 90% bullshit and 10% real work.
I could have done my last job in 2 days if it was just me doing things.
The problem is most of the idiots in charge think if we moved to a 4 day work week we’d do the work of 3 days.
I for one hope the next generations don’t die behind a desk while the guy you work for is off on a yacht living life like it was 1999.
- >I for one hope the next generations don’t die behind a desk while the guy you work for is off on a yacht living life like it was 1999.
  We been spending most our lives
  Livin' in an exploiter's paradise

I'll be happy to do a 4-day week, but don't you dare take away my fucking around and not doing anything at work time!
- You think corporations in the US won't put a twist on it? I can see them making it a 4 10s week. They just hate people and want them to suffer as much as possible.
  
  Pardon, I think that's pronounced "Increase value for shareholders." >.>
  Edit: was supposed to be funny... it's not
  
  I vastly prefer 4 10s over 5 8s. It's a whole damn day saved!
- Yeah, I don't see 4 days work weeks to continually be "no fuck around time" I see it as maybe improved performance for a few months but eventually people go back to "Fuck around" or "coffee runs" or everything that is counted.

This really only applies to office/clerical type gigs. I can tell you that the service sector never gets to rest
- I know what you mean. I spent 10 years as a chef. But i dont fully agree.
  Sure, some weeks you would work 6 or 7 days, but others only 4. And when you did work 6 or 7 you often only work a morning or an evening. If i was doing 4 days i would work 3 afd's (all fucking day) and then one morning or evening. Sometimes your days off were split up so you get a few little breaks throughout the week.
  If im working evenings i get my whole morning and afternoon to do what i want when i feel my most fresh and energetic. If i work mornings i get all afternoon and evening to do what i want. If im working afd's i get an extra day off to to what i want. Plus early week, monday, tuesday, wednesday was always less busy so you could be cleaned up and out of the kitchen by close (10pm) and alot of the shift could be spent in prep, cleaning, organising and having a laugh with the other chefs and smoking. Lots of smoking.
  I work in an office now and i realise that the two are completely different beasts.
  My 9 to 5 leaves me with zero energy mentally which affects me physically by making me not want to do anything with my evenings knowing i need to be up early so in bed early. I get my weekends but i spend them doing housework or something else responsible :(
  Both job types could benefit from a 4 day work week. We need time to recharge and relax. We are just humans.
  Edit: just to add. Life as a chef was hard. Lack of social life, working crazy hours. Bad diet and no discernable sleeping pattern.
  Like i said above. They are different but equally exhasting.
  
  I think it's really important to acknowledge the way an office job can completely destroy your day just due to mental exhaustion, boredom and lack of purpose (or a combination of 3). Thanks for your comment because that was an interesting perspective for someone who only ever worked "office jobs".
  The fact that you are sit in front of a computer doesn't mean that when you are finished you have all your energy left to do what you want, because even if you are not physically tired, if you are exhausted mentally, all you want to do is being passively entertained.
  We could argue at length which job is worse or more tiring, etc. Or we could simply agree on the general principle that everyone should have more time to do what we like.

More than that for me.

I almost feel like this is basically Fridays at my place of work. Since it's not formalized that means I don't have to worry about anyone looking to adjust my salary or PTO or whatever corporate america would do to validate the savings of a 4 day work week. Selfishly I like where it's at, but I do think overall the 4 day work week would benefit us all as long as pay doesn't decrease

I work an 8/6, and I gotta be honest, I don't do much the first and last day unless it's an emergency.
- I work Sunday-Thursday, Sunday is basically my easy day in the office.

Some of you got me wanting to watch OfficeSpace for the first time in years.
Damn it feels good to be a gangster.

Wouldn't this be the same for school then? If we don't give kids the 4 day work week as well then you're just fucking over a large group of adults that don't get the five day work week and I bet your bottom dollar that you'll have tons of staff leave across the country to get that sweet five day work week. What's more precious than time? You can't win against that.

Ah, seems like we pay the peasants for one day just slacking off.

Rookie numbers

Heh... Nobody working on Friday has been a joke since I was a kid. Turns out, it's not a joke!
Of course, the reason why nobody works on Friday always seemed to be anticipation of the weekend, so I would imagine going to a 4 day work week, eventually, would lead to the same thing. Except it'll be Thursday. 🤔
- Broke: Five day work week
  Woke: Four day work week
  Bespoke: Zero day work week

Are there studies into whether we'd spend one day doing nothing in a 4 day work week?

Friday?
- Probably Monday, since that day has the highest suicide rate.

Who cares? If you wanna do nothing on your day off it’s none of the rest of societies fucking business. Why are we so cucked by this system man?
- Hey look a boot kicker defending a garbage system. Good work!
  
  How am I defending the system? My comment was pretty much “this system sucks”
- If you really want to know, might I suggest: http://portalmounta.in

- Yo same. I'm burning out after 3 years of this. I've gotten to the point I don't care anymore and I'm going to less than half ass shit until I make them fire me or I get a new job.
- Same. I'm even working more than 8 hours a day on most days.
  Them white collar guys got it easy and they're still complaining about it!

This is so out of touch.
If you can afford to spend 20% of your time slacking off, you work a part-time job with full-time hours.
- Sorry to break it to you but the one out of touch is you
- Yeah, the article is out of touch. You however, not understanding a huge percentage of the jobs that exist, totally with it.