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The U.S. is the Most Overworked Developed Nation in the World – When do we Draw the Line?
We, as Americans, work too many hours. If you don’t believe so, check out the following data points that compare us to our peers around the world.
American Work-Life Balance
- According to the Center for American Progress on the topic of work and family life balance, “in 1960, only 20 percent of mothers worked. Today, 70 percent of American children live in households where all adults are employed.” I don’t care who stays home and who works in terms of gender (work opportunity equality for all – it’s a family choice). Either way, when all adults are working (single or with a partner), that’s a huge hit to the American family and free-time in the American household.
- The U.S. is the ONLY country in the Americas without a national paid parental leave benefit. The average is over 12 weeks of paid leave anywhere other than Europe and over 20 weeks in Europe.
- Zero industrialized nations are without a mandatory option for new parents to take parental leave. That is, except for the United States.
American Average Work Hours:
- At least 134 countries have laws setting the maximum length of the work week; the U.S. does not.
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In the U.S., 85.8 percent of males and 66.5 percent of females work more than 40 hours per week.
- According to the ILO, “Americans work 137 more hours per year than Japanese workers, 260 more hours per year than British workers, and 499 more hours per year than French workers.”
- Using data by the U.S. BLS, the average productivity per American worker has increased 400% since 1950. One way to look at that is that it should only take one-quarter the work hours, or 11 hours per week, to afford the same standard of living as a worker in 1950 (or our standard of living should be 4 times higher). Is that the case? Obviously not. Someone is profiting, it’s just not the average American worker.
American Paid Vacation Time & Sick Time:
- There is not a federal law requiring paid sick days in the United States.
- The U.S. remains the only industrialized country in the world that has no legally mandated annual leave.
- In every country included except Canada and Japan (and the U.S., which averages 13 days/per year), workers get at least 20 paid vacation days. In France and Finland, they get 30 – an entire month off, paid, every year.
- Then there’s this depressing graph on average paid vacation time in industrialized countries:
The Impact of Too Much Work
I’m not telling you to work less hours. If you genuinely love what you do and are doing it for the right reasons, you are more than entitled to spend all of your waking hours plugging away.
But for many of us, more work leads to more stress and a lower quality of life. Without time to unwind, take care of your home, spend time with loved ones, enjoy our hobbies, connect with friends, and generally live a more balanced life. Stress is the #1 cause of health problems – mentally and physically. And there are few things that stress us out on a consistent basis like work does, especially when it takes away from all of the other things that life has to offer.
Americans are the Outliers
And if all of this data tells anything, it’s that we are the outliers, not the norm. Why are we the outliers?
- Our companies fairly ruthlessly let people go. We want to keep our jobs and not be a ‘low performer’ compared to others.
- The decline of the union has led to less paid time off and other leave benefits.
- Cultural value of money over everything else. We love money, we want more of it, and we think money can buy happiness. And the more we work, the more we get paid.
- It’s been drilled in our heads that we are lazy compared to emerging market counterpart workers in India, Mexico, China, and other parts of Asia. Who isn’t? And what is our mental image of the work environments in those locales? To validate those fears, our jobs are being outsourced to the cheap labor in those countries. In reality, the U.S. is still the world leader in productivity per person.
- Our legislative branch of the government (on both sides of the aisle) has been bought and as a result has shied away from passing laws that protect workers that every other industrialized nation has passed.
- We generally don’t fight for our working rights. We take what is given to us.
What we All Need to Remember
What we all need to remind ourselves is that it doesn’t have to be this way.
- It’s OK to ask to move to fewer hours at work.
- It’s OK to take a week-long vacation if we need to.
- It’s OK to ask to work from home.
- It’s OK to take a month of unpaid leave while you raise a child.
- It’s OK… you get the idea.
Don’t let life pass you by in the name of fear, circumstance, greed, or misguided hopes. Sometimes you just need to draw a line in the sand and say “enough is enough”.
Overworked Discussion:
- Do you think we work too hard?
- Do you like the cultural norm around your workplace on working hour expectations?
- How have you been able to limit unhealthy overworking habits?
Related Posts:
My name is G.E. Miller and 
Brad, I do take some acception to your statement that there is to much government. This has become the montra of the republicans so that they can reduce regulations that protect workers and ship jobs overseas. The deregulation that started in the 80′s is what got us in this mess today. While I do agree that 20 weeks may be excessive there needs to be some type of limit set to help parents of new borns so that they don’t feel as though they will loose there job should they take time off from work. If getting out of debt was only as easily done as we all would like to think I doubt most of us would continue to have some. We need to remember that 50% or more of the work force is just one paycheck from getting behind on payments. We all like to blame government but who is the government? Isn’t it us?
@ Stu/Brad –
I don’t want to make this a political debate, but I think you are both on to something, but I have a slightly different take on it. Brad is correct in that getting out of debt can free us, and it takes a lot of hard work to get there, in addition to living humbly.
At the same time, de-regulation is one of the big reasons that got us in to so much debt in the first place. And had our government protected us more all along, we wouldn’t have to work so hard to get out of all the debt. Business, when not regulated properly, will operate in unethical ways in order to profit. Need proof? Financial crisis. The banks and their political friends spent decades de-regulating the industry and then finding reasons to get people in to mortgages that they could not afford. I work with someone who worked at Countrywide Financial (which went under b/c people couldn’t pay back the gaudy loans they had and the homes had to be foreclosed), who said that underwriters were told to take the attitude to ‘look for a reason to approve someone for a loan’ vs. ‘look for a reason not to approve someone’. He said it was a joke amongst everyone and they all knew it was unethical. Guy has held a steady job for two months? Approved for $500,000! Banks convinced everyone they could afford more than they could, which inflated home prices for everyone, resulted in the foreclosure crisis, and put many banks under. De-regulation (or lack of it in the first place) mixed with a poorly financial educated consumer base are the reasons for the financial crisis.
Credit card companies? Look what de-regulation resulted in there. The onus of responsibility is on our governments to protect us from unethical business practice. When they don’t? We all pay, in one way or another. Businesses won’t do it on their own and there aren’t enough of us who are smart enough to wade through all of the traps.
With all of that being said, I think there are other reasons why we are overworked and being in too much debt is just a small part of it.
Yes, it was unethical for the banks to have given loans to people who couldn’t afford it. Big government did that. They should not have stepped into that, it ended in a lose-lose situation. The banks went under and lost profit, people ended up in debt and their homes were forclosed. I agree with you on that. Regulations need to be adjusted, not added. There are some regulations out there that just are not good on anybody. Like that small business startoff thing(excuse my lack of exact numbers, I’m going by memory here), Small business made up about 99% of jobs, and, big businesses all had to start somewhere. Our economy needs more businesses, so everybody’s working conditions can improve. If businesses had to compete for employees, they’d make better offers, just like their products/services.
its all government, not regulations. our problem stems from the federal reserve lending out 16 trillion in 2008 to banks, effectively crushing the value of the dollar. pay raises do not happen enough to fight the inflation.
and then taxes. we pay a minimum of 40% of all money earned back to the government.
is not ok to take a week off, or even a month….they’ll fire ya! Then you’ll be even more depressed as you lose your house, car, and end up living under a bridge.
Stu!
The larger your government, the smaller your wallet! Government cannot exist unless you pay taxes that pay the government employees. Where do you think Uncle Sam gets his money? from thin air? No, it comes directly out of your wallet. The more government workers, the smaller your wallet. Republican smuglian……has nothing to do with it. It’s plain old common sense! The bigger the governemnt, the higher your taxes, the less money you bring home on payday. Howdoya like going broke?
Big government taking our money is not the problem here. The real problem is the fact that wages in this country have not even tried to match inflation over the years. If we had the minimum wage in this country would be near $20 an hour (about the equivalent that it was in the 50′s). We wouldn’t even notice or miss the small portion of that income the gov’t would need to give us all those awesome programs and benefits ALL the other first world countries get to enjoy. Also more parents would be able to stay home and create better home environments for the next generation to create better happier workers. But the american people decide to believe the lies that big business feeds into the media that if the wages were higher they would leave. Oh, well. Long live America! LoL!
Stu, I think you may be underestimating not only our ability to pay off our debt and live a different life, you may be underestimating how much of a problem debt really is. It is as simple as that, BUT that’s not to say there aren’t other factors to throw into the mix.
What you are saying is that if Government stepped in (when needed) to stop evil people from taking advantage of others. I am saying you don’t need regulation to get what you say you want to get.
I can only speak from example here but bare with me because I think this is powerful. My wife and I used to live paycheck to paycheck. We also had $26,000 in debt. Our payments were killing us, and truly hindering our ability to get our head above water.
We decided to take responsibility for our financial situation which meant relying on us to fix OUR problems. We made hard decisions and sacrificed and cut our budget to enable us to move forward. We were also both working at the time.
We worked HARD. Debt freedom baby!
Now we have two kids, no debt and an emergency fund, and guess what else? Only one of us works now, and it’s completely because we became debt free and freed ourselves from handing over our paychecks to lenders.
We were able to take a $30,000 cut in income and that’s a conservative estimate, all because we were doing things different. We had no debt and we had for the first time ever, emergency savings.
I am the stay at home parent in our situation and not only did we avoid crappy daycare, I get to work from home and spend lots of precious time with my kids. All I am saying is that we took action and our situation changed, and we aren’t special, we just did something about it instead of wait for Uncle Sam to do it for us.
About the maternity thing. It’s against the law to fire someone that is taking a legitimate maternity leave. (at least in VA)It’s when they want to be off longer that causes the problem. My wife took off 3 months and we felt it was too long. Again the COMPANY should not be required to pay someone for 20 months and expect to still have a business for very long.
You mentioned sending jobs overseas. Regulations and higher taxes and minimum wage regulations make it harder to run and maintain a business. It’s not a company’s responsibility to take care of and wipe their employee’s butts. Their only job is to pay their workers what their workers agreed to accept as payment for their work. That’s it. And some companies choose to offer benefits to reliable hard working employees in order to keep them.
Sorry about the extremely long comment, I had lots to say. I stick by my statement that debt is one of the biggest reasons for the problems people face in society today. Eventually the diaper has to come off and people have to be responsible for themselves. I know that sounds harsh to people with views like yours but I can tell you that it wasn’t until I changed my perspective that my life changed for the better. I used to ask when the Government was going to make my life easier too.
Let’s just say I waited and waited but no one showed. I’m now 35 and my life is wonderful.
Very respectfully,
Brad Chaffee
Enemy of Debt
Go ahead, bust your ass, socailism (not communisim) rules! I’ll pay my 60%+ tax for all my benefits and free time. Less crime, more freedom, and no involvement in wars, I love it.
It is certainly working well for Greece and Spain
That’s not the reason either of those countries are in trouble. And actually, it works great for Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Switzerland, etc.
All countries with exceedingly low populations and extremely non-diverse economies. Those nations also don’t participate in global events like shit blowing up in Haiti, Japan, and a little place called Africa. We’re OK working harder than everyone else. Put your hard hat on, pick up your pick and take a little pride in it.
In a way, it does look like wage slavery. One objective indicator of wage slavery, in my opinion, would be the percentage of workforce actually having two or more jobs or wishing they had. What a second job really means is that people are willing to part with an increasingly scarce resource (quality time, a.k.a worthwhile life) without due monetary compensation in the form of overtime pay.
G.E. Miller,
I get that some regulation is needed, but I think when you start saying that it’s the reason people are in debt, you’re taking a lot of the blame off of the consumer and ignoring a major component to why Americans are struggling.
The scariest thing you said was “de-regulation is one of the big reasons that got us in to so much debt in the first place.”
So you’re saying that because mommy stopped wiping Junior’s butt when he was 5, she’s the reason he pooped his pants when he was 6.
You’re talking about grown adults here, most of which have a college education, that decided to spend more money than they actually made. No one forced them to do that, and I would be willing to bet that most of them new exactly what they were doing. Debt is a temptation people chose to partake in, they aren’t forced. (except for in medical situations)
Saying businesses won’t do it on their own is a pretty broad statement. You’re essentially saying that all business is bad and can’t be trusted. I would be willing to say that MOST EMPLOYERS are fair and honest and should be given credit for that. Sure there are some that become greedy and take advantage of others in the name of profit, but you deal with those employers on a case-by-case basis. You don’t punish the whole group for what a few did wrong. If someone mistreats an employee unfairly then they should be reported and dealt with legally.
If you want to look at how over regulation hurts business and why so many have resorted to moving overseas, you should look at the impact of unions in this country. They were once needed but now are used to exploit “evil” businesses for PROFIT.
Unions are to employees what debt is to families. It tears down what could be strong in the name of helping. Gee, thanks for the help.
The bottom line is that if someone is working somewhere where they do not feel they are making what they’re worth, then they need to get off their butt and apply for a job that will pay them enough. If they don’t have the skills to make more money then they need to get the skills. Minimum wage shouldn’t be raised because some people can’t figure out that a minimum wage job which requires no skill, is not meant to support a family.
This country needs more people to realize that taking responsibility for their decisions instead of expecting someone else to save them, will teach and help them grow the most.
We need mommy to stop wiping our butt when we’re 5 because if she keeps doing it then we’ll never learn how to — or care to — do it ourselves.
Perhaps instead of trying to convince people that they need someone to save them, it would be a better idea to educate them before they become a stupid adult. Regulation isn’t what’s needed, it’s better financial education. Most of which leads to better paying jobs and helps people make more informed financial decisions. You can’t take advantage of an educated uniformed consumer.
Sorry for the blog post here but again, I had a lot to say. I must add that I have enjoyed this pleasant discussion. Thanks guys.
Most of these people are not college educated, as the US has one of the lowest rates of college graduates among industrialized countries. We have great universities, but only a select few can afford them. Some low-income people may be able to get a grant or scholarship, but most cannot.
While I agree that people must take individual accountability, I am sure that to do so there must be a level playing field. This means that corporations should not be able to pay lower overall tax rates than individuals (subsidized lending, income tax, sales tax. etc.). It also should mean that a company should have an amended set of freedoms, not full individual constitutional protection.
The blame is on both sides, but the potty-training needs to be done for companies as well. Imagine if every individual in the US had their student loans erased instead of irresponsible corporations receiving bailouts. Companies are too big to fail, but our workforce isn’t? Interesting.
As the saying goes, if the truth was really true, it would be so obvious that there would be no debate. Take care.
By the way, I am new to posting comments. Not that it matters, but my qualifications are being a manager of a multimillion dollar multisite healthcare clinic system, earning an MBA with a 3.95 average, and having over 10 years of experience in finance. I also have a degree in public administration and a degree in nursing. It doesn’t make me correct, but may add background to my comments.
CLC
100% agreed, booyah. Man, you said what I wanted to, only better.
* That’s supposed to read, “You can’t take advantage of an educated well-informed consumer.”
Thanks again for the discussion.
“You can’t take advantage of an educated well-informed consumer.”
I disagree…or at least question your understanding of a well educated and well informed customer:
All you need to do is throw out loads of BS out that means nothing, and an educated well-informed consumer will stop wasting time trying to figure out what is up, down, left, or right. They will start to make decisions based on personal experience, and BAM.. .all you need to do is keep filling them with BS and they’ll keep using your product.
It’s what advertisers, companies, and politicians have done for a long time. Well-informed is something America does not specialize in.
unless the market is limited and youre the only supplier or a product that is needed.
patents need to be more vigorously regulated, as it stands its a big problem.
there are companies who file for bogus patents, which get approved for whatever stupid reason, who charge small amounts of money to developers to use what they “own”, so its cheaper for the million companies that this effects to each pay the nickle instead of paying for a lawyer to fight against it.
right now there are so called “patent trolls” who do this with just about everything, apple is one, they are trying to say that other companies cant make rectangular phones because they were the.. well maybe not the first, err not the second, but they were there somewhere, and they made a phone, and it was rectangular, and now no one else can make a rectangular phone, or black either, their phones were black, so no one else can make black phones.
and what apples doing is just the tip of the ice burg, i dont know your background (so im not sure how technical i can be, ill assume no knowledge of software development), but many software companies cant make their products anymore unless they get the go ahead from some of these patent trolls: its been said that being a software developer today is like trying to operate a store without doorways, because theyre the one who ‘invented’ doorways, you know the thing that you walk through, ya that thing, you cant use one unless you pay me $10 every time someone walks through that doorway.
just look at how patenting has skyrocketed in the last few years by certain companies and you’ll see who the culprits are, microsoft has something like 15k patents, apple has something like 10k patents, how many do they need to be successful in their business? well lets look at one of the most successful software companies in history, google has something like 600 patents
Speaking of long work weeks, I work in an industry here in the US where they legally don’t have to pay overtime until you reach 60 hours. This rule, in the trucking industry is meant for the long haul, over the road drivers that put in 14 hour days, however the freight companies get away with using it for their dock workers, office workers, and hourly city drivers as well. My company has everyone scheduled for five ten hour shifts a week, and nobody is allowed to go over sixty hours, because their policy is to not pay OT at all.
Curtis,
Here’s an idea. How about instead of complaining about a job that doesn’t meet your expectations, you find a job that will?
The Fair Labor Standards Act “REQUIRES overtime to be at least one and one-half times an employee’s regular rate of pay after 40 hours of work in a workweek.”
If the company you work for is breaking that law they should be reported.
More importantly, why would you want to change a company policy and still work for the same evil people that were breaking the law in the first place? Why not report them and go work for someone a little more honest.
Also a company is not bad for not wanting to pay overtime, only for allowing people to work overtime and not pay them properly for doing it.
Koreans work much longer than Americans. Is Korea not an industrialized country? It has the 7th largest economy in the world.
ndalum
On paper it appears so. The same would be true of the Japanese as well. On paper they appear to work much much longer hours, but the truth is they are much less productive. My wife who live in Japan for six years and had short stints in Korea has told me numerous stories.
The average skilled office working Japanese man or woman comes to work at 8-9am. They sit at their cube for 4 or 5 hours surf the web, IM, facebook, etc. Then they hang out with their co-workers at lunch hour. Then around 1:30-2:00pm they sit down and finally start working. The men are especially bad. Around 8:30-9:00pm they finally finish up working and go out and hit the bars, strip clubs, etc.
Around 2:30am – 3:00am they come home, drunk, etc. and are not into work until 8:30-9:00 the next day. The Koreans are very similar in this regard as well.
So again on paper based on the number of hours, it appears they leave USA in the dust as far as working hard, but in reality they are very inefficient in the hours of work actually performed.
I live and work in Japan right now, and well… that’s somewhat accurate. I have 20 paid vacation days a year and I fully intend to use them all. However, while most Japanese workers may have slightly more paid vacation days than in the US, they rarely use them all. Also, we are technically supposed to get separate days for sick leave, but oftentimes you are somewhat indirectly forced (japan is a very indirect country…..) to use your vacation days for this.
I will say this, as far as productivity goes, Japanese workers aren’t necessarily the serious robots/drones you would imagine. They often fall asleep at their desks and do plenty of unproductive things at work. Of course, there are super serious ones, too. The important thing is that they /look/ busy. They also go out and drink a lot. Public drunkenness is very socially acceptable here and it’s customary for offices to have many work parties throughout the year and get drunk together. Going to snack bars (small bars in which hostesses/ladies of the night work at) is very common for Japanese men and it’s not really seen as a scandal.
Agree.. have lived in Korea for 17 of the last 25 years, and their work ethic makes us look bad. 6 day work week, 10-12 hour work day.. And they do not compare to the Japanese, who look at life from a totally different mind set. Their kids succeed because they are driven, or should I say driven by their parents. They take this work ethic in to their participation in Sports too, and have been very successful on the world stage there (baseball, skating, soccer, archery, etc)
Don’t agree with Chris on that they waste their day on facebook and long lunches, but do agree that they like to their drink and other social activities. Most Koreans spend Sunday charging up (sleeping and eating) in preparation for the coming week.
@BRAD… thanks for that great idea. After rereading my post however, I don’t think is sounds like complaining, more like informing. I work for a great company, and they are well within the legal parameters for doing this. It is not so cut and dry, where all employers must offer overtime pay after 40 hours a week. If you go to the US labor law website you will see there are certain exemptions. Furthermore, if they were an OT after 40 company, then they would limit my hours to just that, so I am fortunate for the ability to put in more time some weeks when the extra cash is needed.
I do thank you though for your general concern for my well-being, although I am quite worried about you if your only options for 10:22 on a Sunday morning are to pick fights with random people on blogs.
CURTIS, sorry if you were offended dude. I was certainly not picking a fight with anyone, just stating my opinion based on what I thought was being said.
I saw nothing disrespectful or bully-ish about what I said, I was just making a suggestion based on my experience. Had you actually been complaining about how many hours you worked, it would be completely reasonable for me to suggest the alternative.
I have no idea what’s relevant about what time or day I decided to respond though. What does it matter what day it is? Would Monday at 5:30 sharp be better for you?
Sorry if I misunderstood your post, it seemed like you were complaining about how many hours you had to work without actually getting paid overtime. This post was about needing government to step in and save us and your comment seemed to imply that your situation was an example of why the post was right.
Perhaps I made the mistake of assuming you were responding to the post when you could of been referring to a comment someone made about long work weeks.
For the record, I disagree with any company being exempt from paying someone who worked over 40 hours overtime pay. Sorry about the misunderstanding on my part.
Forgot something:
That our thug managers or whoever is above you in the pecking order is siphoning what you might have made, in a raise you didn’t get or bonus, into his or her bonus. Of course its impossible to prove since its all smeared out in the accounting but being captive what can anyone do about it. “Don’t like it? Then you know where the door is.”
Does anybody still think we’re not a 3rd world country anymore? Sure feels like we are.
Why the 3rd world country comparison? Have you been to one of these countries? Then you’d realize it’s ridiculous. Do you see young children in America, under the age of 10, out on the streets peddling souvenirs, begging or scrounging trash heaps for metal or other scrap that they can sell and earn themselves the price of their next meal? No? Well, point made then.
Frankly American parents spend far too much money on rather useless gaudy toys, such as game consoles etc., on hyped designer brand clothing or celebrity line clothing or sports shoes and so on – and the parents who WOULD object feel pressured to not make their child the only one without such things and the social outcast or misfit so they cave in and buy that stuff. Of course, you can’t blame them with all the pressure from advertising, and children wanting to emulate their Hannah Montana or sports star/music star idols. That’s probably where this mentality of living beyond one’s means and keeping up with the (celebrity/rich) Joneses comes from and why there’s a lot of credit card debt and lack of proper saving for the future.
I sooo do not agree with us being a third world country YET, but I do have to disagree with the no homeless children line…I was one and tge statistics are in the thousands. That is all.
I am behind the post(er) that mentioned efficiency. I think all of us agree that the companies and agencies that we deal with as consumers and citizens are most times on the verge of useless in the way of accomplishing/offering the represented service/product. Idk about you but I can guesstimate 10% of the time do I ever have a pleasant, efficient experience when dealing with a purchase or service of that item. They are behind, over capacity, have a heavy workload or some other lame excuse as to why MY ball got dropped and I have to call or visit and ask the right damn question just to get the minimum of what I already paid for!!
So back to the original point..do I want gov to interfere HELL NO they got their hand in enough cookie jars!! O believe me they would pinch something out and tack it on their personal Christmas…I think the answer lies in this efficiency notion, as in forcing companies to do what they claim and get paid for right the first time…in other words force ethics…a damn shame!!
You obviously haven’t been to the inner city lately. I live outside of Philadelphia, and some areas are no different from a third-world country. Actually, no–there is a difference: the houses are older and more likely to kill residents when they collapse or catch on fire. I’m from a small town in Vermont; these neighborhoods are like an alternate universe. There’s a reason people refer to them as ghettos. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Camden_NJ_poverty.jpg)
The plight of many people in the southeastern area of the country is similar. It’s not uncommon have no running water or no electricity–not because it’s unavailable, but because it’s unaffordable. My boyfriend would let their neighbor’s two young children use his garden hose so they’d have enough water to flush their toilet.
If you think these people are just not working hard enough, that they should “pull themselves up by their bootstraps,” let’s examine the resources they’re given:
In Detroit, the functional literacy rate is around 53%. (“Functional literacy” means that you are able to fill out a form or read road signs.)
According to the U.S. Department of State, Haiti–the poorest country in the western hemisphere, with an average per capita income of $733 per year–has a literacy rate of 56%.
Think that Detroit is an exception? Nope. One in seven people in the United States can’t read what you’re reading right now. In Washington, D.C., the CAPITAL OF THE COUNTRY, 19 percent of the adult population lacks the ability to read basic prose.
That sure as hell doesn’t sound like a first-world country to me.
This is a huge nation. Just because you don’t regularly see desperate poverty doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It just means that you can afford to ignore it.
By the way: I’m not saying that I’m not privileged. I’m just saying that we should appreciate how lucky we are–we’re a lot closer to the third world than most people think.
Sources:
http://theweek.com/article/index/215055/detroits-shocking-47-percent-illiteracy-rate
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_literacy_rate
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/1982.htm
http://nces.ed.gov/naal/estimates/StateEstimates.aspx
@Brad Chafee:
Brad, I think you’ve made some extremely valid points on the debt problem in this country, however I do think that deregulation and lack of financial education had something to do with it.
Problem 1: The level of consumerism in this country is getting out of hand. We are a culture that needs ‘instant gratification’, and that mixed with the growing level of consumerism is a huge contributor to the immense amounts of consumer debt in this country. For example, if you car is still fully functioning, what is the real reason you feel the need to purchase a brand new car? Beacuse our culture puts a high value on material things.
Problem 2: The lack of financial literacy in this country is unbelievable. A vast amount of Americans do not even know how to create a basic budget. To @Brad Chafee’s earlier point, “You can’t take advantage of an educated well-informed consumer” – those consumers who knew what they could afford, knew what fit into their budgets, and were disciplined enough to stick to that amount, didn’t get ‘conned’ by these shady mortgage brokers (and yes, the problem was perpetuated by the shady mortgage brokers and shady mortgage practices within large mortgage companies). We, as Americans, need to take some responsibility of our hard earned money.
Now – that had noting much to do with G.E’s article. My take on that is simple. Whether or not you agree with the amount of hours that are worked, the amount of vacation that is alotted, etc, the fact of the matter is that working endless hours isn’t actually productive. If you’ve ever read the book ‘The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working’ by Tony Schwartz, Jean Gomes, and Catherine McCarthy Ph.D., you are familiar with the research behind these claims. If you’re not familiar with it, I highly recommend taking the time to read it – if you’re on here reading through these comments, you have at least a slight interest in the subject. Companies that encourage 60/80/120 hour work weeks are not actually getting the best out of their employees, and working longer hours does not make you a better performer. You may be doing more work, but that work is subsequently of lesser quality – our brains don’t have a 10-14 hour attention span.
We all have different priorities in life – whether we ‘live to work’ or ‘work to live’ – they are your personal priorities. If you choose to put work before your family/friends, it’s your choice. If you choose to strive to make more money, to climb the ‘corporate ladder’, etc that’s your choice. That may not be the way that I choose to live my life, but if it’s how you derrive happiness, then more power to you.
Take a step back, let your emotions cool down some, mentally set aside your preferred public policy positions for the moment, and look at what life in third-world countries is actually like. I think, if you make a serious attempt to do this, you will realize the US is nothing like third-world countries (no wars, no famines, much less political corruption, much less crime, freedom of speech and of the press, freedom of religion, right to a fair trial, &c.).
The key paragraph in this article is:
“Using data by the U.S. BLS, the average productivity per American worker has increased 400% since 1950. One way to look at that is that it should only take one-quarter the work hours, or 11 hours per week, to afford the same standard of living as a worker in 1950 (or our standard of living should be 4 times higher). Is that the case? Obviously not. Someone is profiting, it’s just not the average American worker.”
Very few comments here take up this historical perspective.
Now, I read Reader’s Digest back in the 50s (god help my soul) and every number was full of gush about labour-saving devices and the good life these promised. Lighter more enjoyable work, cleaner, healthier environment, more and better leisure. Getting better all the time. And for everybody, of course.
You’d think we’d feel the goodness if all this was the case. But we don’t, cos it ain’t.
“Labour-saving” devices have eaten jobs and increased pressure on their operators.
Work may be “lighter” in some ways, but that depends who you are and what you’re comparing. Some of our deadlier jobs (body and bone breaking, toxic, etc) have been exported, along with some of our worst old working conditions and labour relations. And these conditions of slave labour are used in the most cynical fashion to
threaten us back home.
More enjoyable work? For Google employees, maybe.
Cleaner, healthier environment – for who? In inner cities? Near nuclear waste dumps? Noise pollution, light pollution? Go for a pleasant walk around your neighbourhood, any time you feel like it? Well, the Cuyahoga River doesn’t catch fire as often now, but would you swim in it?
More and better leisure – HA. Someone mentioned better TV… Kids have a real choice out in the suburbs – drugs or the church. “I go out walking, after midnight, in the starlight…” – yup.
Getting better all the time – only today none of us feel we will have a better life than our parents did. And our parents damn sure don’t envy us!
For everybody…
Americans right now are too traumatized and terrorized by the fear-mongering propaganda fed them day in day out to think straight. They imagine that however crappy their own conditions are, everywhere else is worse, hence more frightening. The imagined threats from foreigners – aliens – are just their own fears projected on to others.
It’s a social, economic and political challenge, and needs dealing with outside “official”, established areas of debate and policy-making.
So, good luck America.
And good night.
I am not genius. I will not pretend to be. I simply found this interesting and had a few thoughts:
I think a healthy dose of personal responsibility and a pinch of gov’t regulation would be great. Family values are super important to me, much more important than the material things some use to measure standard of living. In fact, one could argue that those material things that equate to a higher standard of living are the very things that are causing us to be so overworked. It seems like we view more and more things as necessary these days… but are they really? I think this post kind of hinted at that. I also think that some of the reason people are feeling the pinch is that they simply got in over their heads by buying those things and, yea, spending money you don’t have isn’t a great idea even if banks and CC companies are trying to pull you in all the time. We do need to man up about money.
I know that these times are trying, however. As much as people would like to work less or request time off, sometimes that’s just not realistic and that makes me terribly sad, too. I’m ridiculously grateful for the opportunities I’ve had this past year. I’m even grateful for the time I’ve spent below the poverty line because it gave me perspective.
Danielle said, “I see the increase in the percentage of working mothers as positive – women contribute a tremendous amount to their families when they are happy and earning income. When women don’t have enough opportunities, that unhappiness has a huge negative effect on their children.”
Notice how this comment seems to be equating earning income with happiness. As the article states, this is part of the problem in the United States. In fact, I have personally noticed that most children in my community never get to see their parents for any real quality time any more, and instead turn to video games and gang activity. This may not be a trend all over the country, but considering the percentages within my immediate community alone, I’d say that we’re working too damned much.
Mr. Miller, thank you for this article. People can deny it all they want, but that graph is a perfect illustration of just how shafted the working Joe/Jill in America really is.
I’m pretty sure most Americans work to pay for all the expensive shit that living in American society dictates they need to own, as long as they’re not just working to pay their credit card bills/mortgages.
LOOK AT HOW STUPID AND ACCEPTING YOU ALL ARE! LOOK AT HOW NONE OF YOU HAVE FIGHTING WORDS! LOOK AT HOW DUMB FUCKING STUPID YOU ARE TO ACCEPT THESE EXTREME HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS, AND YOU TALK ABOUT BLAH BLAH AND YOU DON’T DO A DAMN THING ABOUT IT!!!!
SLAVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@Capitain:
… euuuh … yes I do: I am on vacation this week. This is my fight.
Oh sorry, I forgot to switch on the fighting words, here we go:
YES I DO !!!!! I AM ON VACATION THIS WEEK !!! THIS IS MY FIGHT !!! TIME OFF RULEZ !!! (checking which other words you used — you are my role model as the internet, keybord typing fighter, living room couch Rambo) BLAH BLAH FUCKING STUPID !!! YEAH !!!
(nice, the shouting really helps)
This article is utterly ridiculous. Other industrialized nations can afford to pay for maternity/paternity leave for a year or more because people pay 45%+ of their paycheck to taxes. Leave is paid for by the government, not by the employer. Very few people have jobs that could be left for a year or more without an employer having to hire someone else to do that work – why should your employer continue to pay you for that year, AND have to pay someone else to actually do your job? Do you really want the government deciding what everyone should and should not spend money on, by taking your money and then spending it for you instead of allowing you to make your OWN choices about what you want?
And as for vacations, etc. – Economics research has shown over and over that employers pay people for the work that they do. If you get 3 weeks of “paid vacation” every year, you’re trading off for a smaller salary (other things constant) than someone who doesn’t require that time off. So if the government mandates paid time off, then salaries are going to decrease. Maybe some people LIKE working and would rather work and make money because we don’t feel a need to have 3+ weeks off work every year.
And as a young professional woman who has no intention of having children, I think it’s ridiculous that I’m paid less because of the expectation that I’ll choose to have kids at some point and possibly quit my career, or at least cost my company a lot more in terms of leave and health insurance benefits. I think that people should be free to make their own choices about how to live their lives, but I don’t think that I should have to subsidize the choices YOU make by working longer and harder to make up for you taking time off for personal reasons.
Stephanie: you are correct about the taxes. I have a PhD, I work in a large international company at an executive level and earn a very good salary. I will be able to afford a reasonable retirement. Nothing fancy but reasonable. In the US I would retire at 50 and live a cozy life.
I had several opportunities to move to the US at an equivalent position with a good salary. I decided not to – just because I prefer to have a family life and long vacations.
As for vacation; the compulsory 3 (your case I guess) to 8+ weeks (my case) are there so that some people are simply not worked out to death. Have a look at a book called “Germinal” by Emile Zola. I am sure you have in the US your fair share of pre-”compulsory paid vacation” stories.
Finally about your last point. In a world where everyone pays for himself and there is strictly no people-subsidized groups (think government, schools, hospitals, …) I agree with you. If this is not the case (and it is not neither in my country nor in yours) YOU should have to pay (a lot) if you do not want to have children. This is because someone needs to pay for current and future expenses of the country. This is your free choice, and it comes with a price tag, like everything else.
Along the same line – if a woman wants to have children, her employer should be heavily payed so that he has the slightest interest to employ women (that is you). Otherwise, in this wild world you describe you would not have a single chance to get employed as you would be more risky than a man, at equal competencies. You may always get pregnant and this would be a loss, isn’t it?
OK, time to go back to family life…
I feel that we really dotn have much to complain about compared to those that live in 3rd world countries with little resources.But I was just reading something about our taxes and how many hours a year we work to pay our taxes it like over 100 days of work .Even the poor felon makes a living wage the problems is that taxes hurt us .If I could work and actually keep that 300 dollars a week I would earn working full time hell Id be better of . I see the logic in paying taxes workmens comp ,SSI ,roads need repairing if we got invaded do you think soilder would defend us hell theyd be running we have to brainwash the youth to be killers for us where captialist god dam it .
We shouldnt die for money or to protect our ant pile .We shouldnt allow religion to flourish ,we should get rid of all that divides the masses . Create equal jobs and more equal oppurtunity .According to this article Europe is giving its women parental leave up to 20 weeks a year Holy cow .I say this is good in America lets give women homemakers benifits ,and extra bonus for cleaning the pots of pans of us men so men can have jobs and also afford to buy prettier hookers.
.
Robert, you had it going so well, buy I believe you are married to a hooker that you bought from a 3rd world country. Time for you to talk with your “Hooker” shrink.
I think it is mostly due to the reason Americans like to live way above their means. so of course spending more than you have means more hours need to work.
People tend to think that working longer hours will mean more work gets done. This is absolutely not the case. People need to work smarter. We’ve become way to bogged down with bureaucratic crap that we don’t even know what efficient means anymore.
America: The land where we buy crap we don’t need to impress people we don’t know. We then spend more time at work to earn back our crap money so we can continue the endless cycle.
We are overweight, antisocial, depressed, worried and status-obsessed.
Trust me; this is not common in certain parts of the world.
Interesting. Let’s pick through a few select parts of this article.
The U.S. is the ONLY country in the Americas without a national paid parental leave benefit. The average is over 12 weeks of paid leave anywhere other than Europe and over 20 weeks in Europe.
This is one of the many times in this article that you call for more government regulation of the free market. Why is this? Why should the government force companies to have “paid parental leave”?
At least 134 countries have laws setting the maximum length of the work week; the U.S. does not.
Why should the government limit production by limiting the amount of hours employees can work? All this will do is drive more companies out of the U.S. and increase unemployment. Do you really think it’s wise, especially in this second Great Depression, for the government to LIMIT production in this country?
Using data by the U.S. BLS, the average productivity per American worker has increased 400% since 1950. One way to look at that is that it should only take one-quarter the work hours, or 11 hours per week, to afford the same standard of living as a worker in 1950 (or our standard of living should be 4 times higher). Is that the case? Obviously not. Someone is profiting, it’s just not the average American worker.
Hmmm. Have you bothered to check inflation levels since 1950? Probably not. Sure, the amount of dollars on an employees paycheck has gone up since then, but his buying power hasn’t. The dollar is worth less than it was in 1950, which means that a man has to work more to achieve a good standard of living. Of course, you can blame the idiots in our government for this. You know, the same people you want to have meddle in private business by telling them how many hours their employees can work.
Our companies fairly ruthlessly let people go. We want to keep our jobs and not be a ‘low performer’ compared to others.
No. Typically, the only way you are going to be let go from your employer is if you are a bad, lazy worker or the company falls on hard times. Work harder and better than others and your will have a job.
Cultural value of money over everything else. We love money, we want more of it, and we think money can buy happiness. And the more we work, the more we get paid.
And whats wrong with this? If you want more money, then work harder. It’s not just going to appear at your doorstep. If you don’t care about how much money you make, then find a job that will allow this.
Our legislative branch of the government (on both sides of the aisle) has been bought and as a result has shied away from passing laws that protect workers that every other industrialized nation has passed.
We generally don’t fight for our working rights. We take what is given to us.
Again, with the increased government meddling. I typically have no problem with employees standing up to management if they feel like they’re getting pushed around or taken advantage of. But at the end of the day you work for your employer, not the other way around. If you want better “workers rights”, then start your own business.
The author says he dreams of “financial independence and freedom”, but judging by his writing here, he seems to think something like that is easy, and it should just happen to you. Sorry, it doesn’t work that way. The only way to financial independence and freedom is hard work. There’s a reason why old people retire. You work hard while your young, invest your money or save it, and then you get to spend your later years relaxing and doing what you want.
Don’t worry though. You’re young, and in years time (and with the wisdom that comes with it), you’ll look back and see how ignorant (not stupid, just ignorant of the way things work) this whole thing is.
One important factor is missing: commute
I dare to say US workers have the longest commute as well.
No thanks, Asshole boss, for banning work-fr-home!
“average paid vacation time in industrialized countries”
That’s actually a graph of legally mandated paid vacation days. The ‘average paid vacation’ in America is not zero. Most folks with middle-class service jobs get two weeks paid, six or so holidays, and at least three paid days of ‘sick’ or ‘personal’ time.
I work at a university where we have pretty generous paid time off, and I usually can’t even use all my days before they time out. I can’t imagine taking upwards of three days a month off, that seems crazy. I run out of stuff to do when I’m out of work for more than a week.
My dad is a 61-year-old psychologist who works about 7 hours per day, 7 days per week. He takes one day off per month to recuperate and an occasional day off to do something he’d like to do, like go to a gun show or just have time with my daughter and me. He has been doing this for the past 5 years, and up until my mom started dying about 4 months ago, he was also on call every Thursday from 6pm until 12am. My boyfriend (22) and I (21) would be happy to help…if we could just find jobs.
Doesn’t anyone else find it frustrating and depressing that so many people have to work that much just to make ends meet?
@ Joesixpack
What if people have different preferences than you? Why is it about your work values? What if it is OK for some people to have a smaller house/ share with roommates? Why do you find this kind of view threatening? Are you a troll?
@joesixpack: you are obviously ignorant (not stupid, just ignorant) but no worries, though – when you realize that there is a world outside yours you will understand a lot of things.
Like, say, that some people may want to have a life outside work and spend it with their families? And that they are not the super fighter kind of people who will stand up to their management?
Or maybe, like in my case today – there was snow around Paris (lots! at lest 5 inches
) and I decided to stay at home and work from here (not a normal thing to do)? My employer was happy as people were still working, could take care of their families (children are on one of their many vacations now) and be happy, return hopefully tomorrow happy to work and work more efficiently.
You know, the kind of things we think about when we grow older. And wiser. And think that our children are gone and we actually missed everything when they were growing up?
Listen up to “Cats in the Cradle” and you may understand why I enjoy having 42 days off over the year and spend plenty of time (no tonly “quality time”) with my kids.
@Elizabeth
[b]What if people have different preferences than you? Why is it about your work values? What if it is OK for some people to have a smaller house/ share with roommates? Why do you find this kind of view threatening? Are you a troll?[/b]
It’s not about “my work values”. I never said that it ISN’T OK for someone to have a smaller house or whatever. What this article is calling for is the government to come in and control, among other things, how many hours employees can work. Do you not even realize how detrimental to production this would be? I really don’t care what you do with your life.
@a frenchie:
you are obviously ignorant (not stupid, just ignorant) but no worries, though – when you realize that there is a world outside yours you will understand a lot of things.
Like, say, that some people may want to have a life outside work and spend it with their families? And that they are not the super fighter kind of people who will stand up to their management?
Or maybe, like in my case today – there was snow around Paris (lots! at lest 5 inches
) and I decided to stay at home and work from here (not a normal thing to do)? My employer was happy as people were still working, could take care of their families (children are on one of their many vacations now) and be happy, return hopefully tomorrow happy to work and work more efficiently.
You know, the kind of things we think about when we grow older. And wiser. And think that our children are gone and we actually missed everything when they were growing up?
Listen up to “Cats in the Cradle” and you may understand why I enjoy having 42 days off over the year and spend plenty of time (no tonly “quality time”) with my kids.
What are you babbling on about? I really don’t care what you do or don’t do with your life since it’s none of my business. But plenty of people (much like you, I would guess) want the government to come in and tell me how to run my life, particularly my business (if I should ever choose to start one). Go on and have your 42 days off a year. If that’s what your company offers, then good for you and your company. But don’t call for the government to come in and try to create a “one size fits all” solution, because all that does is stagnate growth and hurt the small businessman..
You see, YOU are the one who can’t see outside your own bubble. You demand your 42 days off a year, and when you can’t get it, you want the government to force it on everyone. Maybe some people don’t want that much time off. There are people out there who enjoy working their fingers to the bone. I know I would probably lose my mind if I had THAT much time off, because I would run out of things to do.
You are still free to start your own business, and then you can give yourself as many days off as you want.
I realize I’m outnumbered here, but I really don’t care. This mentality of “I want, I want, I want, I want, but I don’t want to have to work too hard for it” is destroying this country.
Yes, I want the government to come and legislate about how businesses who employ people should treat them.
You are surely aware of how work life looked like some time ago (and how it looks like in some “liberal” countries): there was a class of the rich ones and a (large) class of workers who spend their life (literally) at work. No time off, no social security, nothing.
If you want to work on your own nobody will decide about your life. You can work 365 days a year, spend 15 hours at work. You will get rich.
Hopefully you have no family then otherwise this is plain irresponsible. Children want to spend time with their parents, even if it means less money.
So no “one size fits all”. But one “size fits all who want to be in that size”.
I am for basic protection and I do not care to pay for it (though taxes – and this is not something which is missing here in France). I am not a hero, just an average guy for whom life is not just work but 156 other things beyond that.
@ Stephanie
My dad is a 61-year-old psychologist who works about 7 hours per day, 7 days per week. He takes one day off per month to recuperate and an occasional day off to do something he’d like to do, like go to a gun show or just have time with my daughter and me. He has been doing this for the past 5 years, and up until my mom started dying about 4 months ago, he was also on call every Thursday from 6pm until 12am. My boyfriend (22) and I (21) would be happy to help…if we could just find jobs.
Doesn’t anyone else find it frustrating and depressing that so many people have to work that much just to make ends meet?
Yes I do find it frustrating and depressing. Frustrating and depressing because more than likely most of those people didn’t bother to think ahead when they were young and plan for the future, and they typically want the rest of us to pick up the tab for their mistakes.
It is people like you, that have no empathy for others, who think everyone lives in your perfect world. Instead, think if you had set up an IRA early in your career, paid taxes worked hard and followed all the rules. Now you are faced with a catastrophic illness or situation. For some reason beyond your control you have to take a leave from work. Your company decides it is too long and you no longer have benefits or income . You start to tap your savings to pay the bills. Medical expense escalates and you take a second mortgage or loose your home . Say you try to sell it and the value in todays market is 1/2 of what you bought it for. You have to sell at a loss. Meanwhile the IRA you worked so hard to accumulate is the next to go. This done, costing you penalty and taxes for early withdrawl, you watch as your life takes a downward spiral and depression starts to take a toll on your ability to maintain hope of regaining your life as you knew it.Say you were fortunate enough to rise above all this and try to regain lost ground. You had a set back. How many companies are going to be willing to hire you with an adverse medical history? They also check your credit report.You have gotten older and some companies don’t want to invest in someone who might not stick around, isn’t as resilient as a younger candidate? Not to mention the jobs are more and more scarce. How far do you think you could get on minimum wage at this stage of the game? No benefits with many of these jobs, what if you become ill again? I worked with a man who had this similar story.He built 2 businesses and didn’t have to worry about pinching pennies. He found himself alone, collecting pennies off parking meters and city ledges to buy ramen for dinner. Life sometimes happens while you are making plans.
@joesixpack
WOW, you are misinformed. I love how you assume that *most* of the people like my father didn’t plan ahead when they were younger.
When my parents met, my mother was already disabled with a degenerative disease called RSD. Despite having a Masters degree in psychology, when my parents got married, Dad was out of work for 16 months because he just could not find work. Despite that, Dad ALWAYS found a way to pay his child support while doing everything in his power to support our family; my biological father never paid child support and owes my sister and me over $46,000 in back child support.
In November 2006, we found out that the medication my mother had to take to control her chronic pain had, in effect, caused her stage IV colon cancer and metastatic liver cancer. She might have lived longer if surgeons didn’t screw up so much that they had to perform six surgeries within eight months time, which destroyed my mother’s liver and parts of her digestive system because of the large amount of scar tissue. She died September 15. We still have medical bills to pay off dating back to her first stay in the hospital almost four years ago.
What happened to insurance? Well, my dad has private insurance, but premiums for my mother went up after her diagnosis; and she had BlueCare, but they dropped her after they found out she didn’t have the “right” kind of cancer (breast or cervical).
You know, joe, I don’t tell you this to try to get your sympathy; I know better than to expect it from people like you. I tell you this to let you know what a self-righteous, presumptive, downright cruel prick you are. Go to hell.
@joesixpack
So terribly sorry that my family couldn’t “plan ahead” for all the horrible things that have happened over the years.
I didn’t know the US don’t have maximum working hours set!
But it’s terrible how may hours people are willing to sacrifice from their lives. Overworking is not a good thing – it affects citizens’ health as well. That should also be kept in mind.
This is exaggerated and is a lie.
The reason that USA citizens lie their workhours are the longest, I guess, may be to strengthen their rationale.
But I have to tell you a big truth.
South korea surpasses USA in the length of workhours.
Many south koreans aren’t even paid for their overwork.
Please pay attention to south korea.
We, south koreans, are poor people.
Yes, we may be a very overworked nation in the United States, however let’s keep in mind that we generally are compensated very well and in many professions even respected. There are many other countries where people are forced to work many long UNDOCUMENTED hours of manual labor for very minimal pay. Yes, long hours do cut into family and personal time, but let’s still be glad we live in a country with labor laws that require employers to pay overtime. I know it could be better, but it could also be a lot worse!!
I have been in the car business my entire life & now am a single mother of two young children. My son is soon to be 8yrs old & daughter just turned 4yrs old, after stating the above facts about my stupid career choice I soooo much regret more everyday I am fortunate enough to see them. Today is the first time in 7years I have told my employer “NO my son has school activities I must attend & you can pass the deal on to someone else. ” I simply don’t care about the money anymore but at the same time have an overwhelming feeling of guilt about it….. What is worse losing money or disappointing your children? I just miss my kids & this is literally bringing tears to my eyes thinking about everything I have missed out on because….. I was selling a vehicle & more worried about making money than how empty my children felt without their mommy to see them. I want out of the car business soooo bad!
Correction on the above…..Ooops! I meant to say I regret my decision of going into the car business more everyday…. and I feel so fortunate everyday I actually get to see them & spend time with them…..sorry!
Hello all. Talk about the biggest smoke and mirrors scheme of our time. Now that the economy is suffering, Corporate America, has an even bigger excuse to rape us of our lives. I believe in hard work for a decent wage, but when the expectation is that if your work isn’t done, stay until it is; or suffer the stigma of being a slacker, that’s where I draw the line. Or manage your time accordingly, when management knows there is no way to get it done in a 40 hour work week. The label of being a salaried employee is a curse for the ages. No overtime, working for free after 40 hours; your wages per hour nose dive as you crank out 50, 60, even 70 hours a week. There is also no comp time in the form of time off, or leaving early on a Friday, after working like a dog for weeks on end. I have seen this abuse at several companies I have worked for. My current manager comes in at 6:00 every morning, and leaves after 5:00. I have a co-worker who has taken up running. He is already in self defeat due to, after his first half marathon he will be working too much to keep up the training, and have enough family time. Now we are told just be glad you have a job. It’s insanity bordering on communism. They control our lives, and we allow it. The weird part is, that it is a great company, performing very well in this economy. I am burnt out, always having to try and plan, duck, and dodge, just to stay around 45 hours, as may coworkers give me weird looks when I leave on time. I am not lazy at all; as a matter of fact I work very hard, and skip lunch and breaks to get out on time. The money isn’t worth it, life is too short. I know millions of us are stuck due to the sky rocketing cost of living, and fears of not being able to provide for our families. The fat cats know this, and will exploit it to the hilt. I just can’t believe the apathetic mentality of management. I am just over it. Technology should ease the burden on the American worker, not complicate it, and force us into legalized slavery. I am thankful I have a good job with a great company, but balance is thrown out the window. Please America, let’s embrace true Capitalism, but without the greed and willingness to work our lives away sitting in a sterile cubicle. It’s toxic and is turning us all into unhappy, tired, unmotivated drowns.
Some great comments here. It seems like people are finally waking up to the great hoax known as the Calvinist Work Ethic that’s been plaguing our high-tech civilization for far too long now. This is especially appalling in our current age where we have countless labor-saving devices that functionally SHOULD be relieving us from mass drudgery.
A few of the more mean-spirited (perhaps overworked?) commenters (like JSP) are clearly indoctrinated by the Obsolete Work Ethic to a such degree where they each function as a sort of undying ideological mind slave of that ridiculous paradigm.
It’s time we all embrace the abundance that mechanization and automation provides for us and realize that working ourselves to death is a futile endeavor considering the potential that can be unleashed if we are able to part with many of the old, now useless ways of running society. One we free our minds we realize how much of the “work” out there is really pretty useless in terms of actually important things like human life-support systems and scientific/technological advancement. Most of our “economy” simply goes into churning out more and more cheap crap and subsequent waste just for the sake of ringing up more transactions. That, my friends, is the contradictory nature of a debt-based monetary system and a commerce-obsessed culture that feeds such a beast.
Please take some time to contemplate the greater things and life and become more self-aware. You’ll gain a broader perspective and feel a whole lot better in the end. I’m sticking with the red pill. See you all on the other side!
Does anyone remember the story of the Pied Piper??!!
I just don’t understand why there has not been a single post about educating our youth!
We EARN what we LEARN.
We are not learning. Purposely.
Members of the “Intelligencia” would not put up with this!
America is dumbing down it’s very own future leaders. Our children can’t progress until the whole class is all on the same page. Learning curves, are you serious? 100% right is 100% right fer gawdssake!! My son’s teacher INSISTED that “cupid” started with a “Q”!!
We don’t even make our own FOOD here anymore. Someone please explain the Fair Trade Agreement!
I tire of the instant gratification youth. Are you kidding me?! There is no APP for Real Life. You want something, you have to earn it IRL. And don’t burn company time surfing the Web! If you wanna play, you have to pay. Do your job! You waste Company time and MINE AS WELL because I DO CARE and I have to make up for YOUR SLACK. Is there no pride in work anymore??
Politics are all Hollywood now. Best looking, best speaker, and best media coverage. Occupy Wall Street? I do believe that movement originated in CANADA! What?? (And what do they even want?)
God Bless Us All!
I wish I could be the Pied Piper and teach the children how a life of unbiased, educated and harmonious living can be! Shame on the parents who rely on others to raise a child.
We are raising our future, not just our brood.
You mean the LEAST UNDERWORKED, a good thing.
A few thoughts:
1) America is over-worked: We AVERAGE about 47 hours per week(for those who work full time). This is simply too much work. The stress,overeating,etc etc that too much work causes is getting too great for us to bear as a nation-we all need to step back awhile and simply relax(and enjoy our live).
2) America is too uninformed: We spend half of our lives in school,only to learn how to become rock-headed,half ignorant pragmatists who deify money,who never question authority and who completely lack creative thought.
3) America is too Greedy: We are simply too money obsessed. We work all day chasing after the “almighty greenback” and “slaving it up” for rich capitalists who use us to gain even more money for themselves-and sharing less each year with the individual worker.
4) America is too Addicted/Dysfunctional: We(Americans)must be one of the most addicted countries in the world with probably 60-70 % of us addicted to substance or another(can it be because of our collective soullessness?) Further,10% of us are alcoholics,30% are obese,5% are drug addicts,15% have diabetes,and 15% are chronically depressed.
5) Americans have too much debt: We(as a country and individually) have too much debt to be healthy. The nation owes 15 trillion dollars-and each American family has 10,000 usd in debt-far too much debt to be healthy.
Finally,We must demand changes now,and get our collective act together-and as individuals,if we are to go forward in any viable way from here.
5)
It’s not so much a culture that values money and work over everything else that creates these problems. People have to work harder for less money just to stay afloat. America is capitalism at its extreme. We have a lot of myths in our society that capitalism is natural and the best possible economic model, but it obviously is not. We need to remove that idea from our minds and empower leaders that are in favor of more market regulations. We need to remove “socialism” from our national list of dirty words. And lastly, on a more individual level, we should buy local and buy small. It’s not that solutions are hard to accomplish, but that nobody wants to try them.
I feel the author missed a big point: Americans aren’t working that much because they want to, many aren’t doing it because they’re greedy and want $$, but because the price of everything has gone up while wages have come down. That’s the real problem.
More families have both parents working because they can’t afford basic necessities–though this in itself is an argument. An Ipod is not a necessity, but you see them everywhere–even with those who are getting government aid. The system has become corrupt because those who can are exploiting it, both rich and ‘poor’ included.
America and our ancestors worked very hard to raise the standard of living, but now its becoming harder to afford that standard of living. I think we need better price ceilings. And no credit cards. What you can’t afford now, you can’t have now. Simple. We wouldn’t be in this mess if that had been the case.
Oh, and I’d like to point out, most of Europe is in economic turmoil (e.g Greece). Maybe so many paid vacations isn’t the best idea…
The obvious level of poverty between generations is pretty glaring, in the general NY/NJ area.
By way of example,I know more than a few engineers I work for who make a “good” salary and are in fact in the lower 1%. But their parents, lived in larger homes, in better neighborhoods, with better schools and functioning facilities.
As a rule, the generation coming up is largely in significant worse shape economically, with MASSIVE student debt at graduation, or subject to systemic disenfranchisement by not having a degree, what’s most obvious is that glaring difference, between college educated and non-college educated, which has nothing more to do that with society’s bias towards the former.
In that previous generation – the “boomers”, most non-college graduates could afford to buy or build a house and do so without holding 2 jobs per household.
These days, the more relevant question to my mind, is how do we break the cycle of wealth concentration before it breaks the capitalist system entirely.
Have any answers to that question?
People in the uk are lazy. As well as the rest of Europe.
They do NOT want to work at all.
The more your government gives the more you’ll expect from them.
The rest of the world needs to work more.
When you are paid 13 months pay for 11 months of work. You are paid too much or work too little.
Although i will bring up an important point.
The amount we waste in America is much more than in the European countries.
I suppose you don’t have to work as much to pay for food you don’t overeat or waste. Or gasoline. Etc.
Like a home. The better you maintain and not cause a mess.
The less time you have to work to cleanup after yourself (and others).
@Luke: you are so right about us Europeans.
We just want to live a more complex life than yours, filled with work, time off and family time.
I guess we are lazy but hey, it is sunny outside today and I will go for a walk with my children, then help them with their homework and then have dinner with them. Good luck at the office.
Ah, and I will not worry for not being cared after if I break my leg while having good time. If you like a life full of stress and uncertainty about what counts most (family and health) than you will be fine at the office.
I forgot to mention that I love my work and since I spend 8 hours at the office I am very keen to get back the day after and work hard.