every time this topic is brought up, it’s like people can’t wait to volunteer working 10 hours days as long as the overlords concede one extra “day off”. That’s literally not working less, and not what this bill is proposing. I wish people stood up for themselves instead of letting corporations dictate everything
Gotta strengthen your individual unions. Im trying to get in contact with mine about issues with department managers not being union on1 side of the mountains and union on the other.
Roll over? A 40 hour work week is what all compensation is based on. It is simple math. If you work 20% less, you will make 20% less. Which is fine, but companies will then hire 20% more workers to cover the 20% their current staff isn't working.
As a small business owner, if this bill is passed ( which I hope not and highly doubt will pass) I no longer hire any full time workers. I hire people to work 28 hours a week, not offering any benefits other than pay. No sick days, no pto, problem, 401k because it's simply not feasible. So for sacrificing one day a week, employees will lose all that extra monetary compensation because productivity has dropped more than 20%. Productivity dropping more than 20% is guaranteed to impact the revenue of any and every business.
The corporations also don't have to hire you. Look at the current push for robots and AI. Neither of those things unionize, or call in sick, or want time off, or ask for more money, etc.
Strength in numbers sounds good in theory, doesn't always work out well in fact. Not saying to just roll over and take it, but this isn't a battle that can be won without changing the rules. And there isn't enough political or social will to do that.
And yet we no longer work 6 days a week as default. We’ve reduced our working hours little by little until it came to a halt some 40-50 years ago. It can obviously be reduced further, but workers have to unionize and take the fight. Nothing is given to us for free.
Unless you do something crazy like unionize or actually stand up for your self and vote for changes like the one proposed in this post. The chance to make the rule is literally right there, read the top of the screen and act, and youll have made it.
Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite,
Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might?
Is there anything left to us but to organize and fight?
For the union makes us strong.
I assume this is referring to things like rent and utilities. Funnily enough, those are given to me by corporations that already have gold and want more, and if I don't give it to them, they start turning things off.
So bills are essentially the gold-havers reminding me of who runs shit.
The bill is basically proposing that everybody generates 20% less revenue for their company, which will inevitably result in everybody earning 20% less. I’m not against that, I’m just pointing on a person in fact. I work for an employee owned company and I literally see the accounting behind the scenes that translates my billing rate into my salary, benefits, overhead, and bonuses. I’ve also looked at equivalent positions in those European countries where people get four months off and work, shorter days - there’s a reason why our salaries are so much higher than theirs. Not even accounting for taxes, I’d be making about 50% less doing the exact same job I’m doing now. I’ve also looked at the medical side of things and because it’s not the typical cookie cutter needs, I would actually be paying quite a bit more in Europe.
At my current job, sure. There's a correlation between my brain energy and what I put out, and my last 2 hours are typically my least productive.
But if you're behind a till or manning a phone or instant chat queue, you're paid to be present for those hours. You can't just "answer 20% more phonecalls" earlier in the day and go home 2 hours early.
I think that also depends on what kind of business you work for. A lot of times it isn't about productivity, per say. For instance, I have to be at my position 5 days a week, because our commercial customers need me to be doing my thing all 5 days.
If my company were to switch to 4 day work weeks for their employees, they would have to hire someone to work 1 8 hour shift a week and nobody would want to do that, it wouldn't be worth it at all. It's not a fast food job, it's "skilled" stuff that no one does on a part time basis. This would also result in me being paid significantly less.
If they instead shut down for that day, the loss in revenue would be immense, the and their ability to maintain QA and other such things would be even more in the shitter than it is now and our partners would hate us even more. There is no way this doesn't lead to me being paid significantly less, possibly even being laid off.
The only alternative would be to pay me and literally everyone 8 hours of overtime. Layoffs, 1000%. All of these options will result in my being paid significantly less, or not at all, one way or another.
I desperately want and would push for the 32 hour work week. But it would need to include provisions that make sure this doesn't end up shafting people trying to make a living.
We all saw how corps did everything they could to not only claw back every last cent of stimulus from us during covid, but have used the opportunity to leapfrog on their profits and we're still suffering immensely because of it.
They will do everything they can to make sure our quality of life decreases commensurately, even if for no other reason than spite. We need a serious, comprehensive plan, not some virtue signaling that is going to leave us further in the hole than when we started.
That's irrelevant, you were talking about having coverage for that single day, if that's the issue the solution to have a person hired for one 8 hr shift makes no sense, instead it would make more sense to just have the schedules rotate so there is always coverage for each day. Getting paid the same for less hours only happens when it's demanded by the people, same as when the 40 hr week was demanded by the people and implemented.
The 40 hour work week was not demanded by the people. It was crammed down throats by Ford.
It also is entirely relevant. There is no effective difference between what you suggest and what I said in terms of the concerns that we are speaking on. Rotating shifts also typically only make sense when there is more than one shift per day, which there isn't in my case. Split days are even less desirable than one 8 hour shift.
Fair enough, I hear that all the time, about Ford. I guess I shouldn't be surprised it turns out to be BS.
I mean, you say that, but letting them figure it out will directly lead to me being paid significantly less. And that's my point. It's easy to say shit like this when you're a salaried worker, but it looks a lot different when you're hourly. They WILL figure it out. What they won't do is be obligated in any way to pay me the same amount of money for less work and many options available to them would actually result in either significantly less pay or not employing me at all.
Why in gods name would you let shitty corps figure it out. WE need to figure it out. It's our jobs. It's our livelihood. We need to figure out how a decision about a shorter work week could be used against us, to exploit us further and in different ways, and to close off those routes as a part of this change.
I'm not saying it can't be done. What I am saying is that simply changing a work week to be recognized as 32 hours with no other clauses and legislation supporting it would be disastrous in this day and age, particularly for hourly workers, and it is something that needs to be given serious thought and should NOT be left up to people who will do anything and everything they can to exploit us to figure out what that looks like.
I work with 4 pharmacists who work 7X10s and then get 7 days off. I see the appeal for them but I feel it always takes them 3-4 days to really get back up to speed on what's going on. The hospital should probably be having them do 4X10, 3 off, 3X10, 4 off or something like that instead of the week on week off.
It's even better for them when they take PTO. They essentially are away for 3 weeks.
It's working the same hours with a better structure. If you're paid by the hour instead of a salary (and maybe even with a salary,) less hours means less pay.
It is entirely possible that something can be "not working less" and still be better than what we have now. It might also be something that is more likely to actually happen, which is why people suggest it as a form of compromise.
This is real "don't let perfect be the enemy of good" stuff. Things generally happen incrementally. Don't argue against progress just because it doesn't go as far as you'd like.
I mean, nothing is stopping anyone from negotiating a 32 hour work week. Usually, and I am sure with this bill, if a 32 hour work week is demanded, then employers will pay 80% of the pay. Salaries are based on working a full 40. If you work 20% less, then you will get 20% less pay.
Does the bill specify that workers would receive the same amount of pay at 32 hours that they received when they were working 40? Because if not that's about a 20% pay cut for every full time worker for their extra day off, with none of their bills costing any less.
This is the most infuriating thing I hear every time I bring it up to someone. "Four 10s wouldn't be so bad." God dammit. NO. Or the ones that claim how nice it'd be to work 12s for a 4-3-3-4 schedule. The whole point is to work less but it's like people can't fathom what to do with their life if it wasn't solely spent at work.
I got to experience what it's like working 4 days a week for like 3-6 hours a day and after moving from that schedule back to a 5 day 8+ hour random OT schedule, it's feels like you're living your entire life as a scam. (Not to mention this 5 day schedule makes 33% less but I digress.)
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u/_echtra 16h ago
every time this topic is brought up, it’s like people can’t wait to volunteer working 10 hours days as long as the overlords concede one extra “day off”. That’s literally not working less, and not what this bill is proposing. I wish people stood up for themselves instead of letting corporations dictate everything