

Ask HN: Why don't you work less? - martinwnet

Simple question.<p>Why don't you only work 6 or 9 months of the year? Or 4 days a week[1]?<p>In your newfound time you could work on personal/charity projects or add some more to the "life" part of work-life balance, or do anything else you wish.<p>I think it would be harder to find a 4-day-week job, but taking 3 or 6 months off per year should be doable in this profession due to the nature of the work and very high earnings.<p>[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3883268
======
steve8918
I just came back from a 9 month break.

After being in the Valley since the dot-com boom, and going through the bust,
and other personal issues, I was pretty burnt out, suffering from stress-
related health issues, and after a couple of health scares, decided enough was
enough.

I quit my job amicably, and spent 2012 just "doing my own thing". This
entailed spending time on small, frivolous projects that I normally wouldn't
have had time to pursue, and learning things that might help me in my career
later on. I also spent a lot of time cooking dinner for my wife.

I don't spend a lot of money in general, but even so, I didn't curtail my
spending at all, so I ate through a big chunk of my savings. I didn't care,
and my wife and I even went on several trips. Obviously, having a working
spouse helps, but one thing you learn after suffering through a few health
scares is that money will come and go, but you're only young once, and your
health (physical and mental) is pretty much the most important thing you have.

I didn't have any vast goals like creating a startup, or even creating my own
iPhone app. I ended up not doing a lot except learn, but I really did feel
refreshed and more important, I felt a lot better about myself and about
programming in general. I spent 6-7 days a week, 6-10 hrs a day programming
and learning, so I didn't waste any time at all, but didn't feel stressed out
once. I even started working out again, although I didn't hit any of my weight
targets.

After about 9 months, I figured it was time to get back to the world of the
gainfully employed. Thankfully, no one cared that I took the time off, and I
was able to get a new job at a company that I really am excited about within a
few weeks.

~~~
pestaa
Really good for you; this story is a true inspiration for me. Good luck.

------
dagw
Everybody I know who earns anywhere close to enough to take 6 month of the
year off work themselves half to death. 60-80 hour weeks (or more), all-
nighters, weekends, hardly any time off etc. etc.

Not interested.

I'm much happier working 40 hours a week, never having to work over the
weekends, hardly ever having to do any over time or face ridiculous deadlines,
and having a reasonable number of vacation days I can spread out through the
year. I consider this a much better work-life balance and I'm equally happy
taking a pay cut to get this.

~~~
bps4484
"Everybody I know who earns anywhere close to enough to take 6 month of the
year off work themselves half to death."

This isn't true for everyone, it just depends on your lifestyle. In Silicon
Valley you can earn 100k a year being a programmer that asks for standard 9-5
hours (or 10-6), so the real question is whether you can live on ~50k a year.

------
Jgrubb
Because I don't make that much money.

Because I enjoy working.

Because, with 3 kids at home, work is a lot less work than being home. The
most exhausting week this entire year was the vacation we took to the beach.

------
LVB
Because I'm paranoid that either the industry gets hammered (jobs go away or
salaries fall) or my own ability to earn somehow goes away. I work a lot and
save a lot now because I can. I don't judge other approaches negatively, but
I'm hardwired from an early age to work like this.

~~~
lhnz
You're probably right to worry about losing the ease of employment and high
salary as only a minority of the jobs require very high levels of skill.

The real reason for the high salaries is because there aren't very many
developers. However, from what I can see, there are machinations underway
which will correct a lot of the supply problems over the next couple of
decades. Many governments are pushing for primary school computer science
education, and we have hacker schools and startups like codeacademy springing
up everywhere. The money and success is going to attract the general
public[0][1] many of which are finding it very difficult to get jobs, and they
will come despite the perceived geekyness of the profession ultimately causing
a cultural shift[2] before everything stabilises. Sort of like a mini gold
rush.

That's my two pence anyway... :)

[0] <http://www.thesocialnetwork-movie.com/>

[1] [http://www.bravotv.com/start-ups-silicon-
valley/season-1/abo...](http://www.bravotv.com/start-ups-silicon-
valley/season-1/about)

[2] I suspect we will eventually lose high average salaries but gain higher
status as development becomes a more socially acceptable job.

------
TamDenholm
I do, problem is, I'm extremely lazy, I cant work for long periods of time
because i get fed up with it, but i've found a way to deal with it and make
good money. I'm a contractor. I work anywhere from 1 week to 3 months at a
time in a place, get paid a day rate and then take some time off and repeat.

My current earn to frugal living ratio is: 5 working days buys me a month of
living expenses.

Currently though i'm working very hard because i'm in the process of buying a
non-tech real world "lifestyle" business that will run with minimal hours
after a initial time investment peroid, which should allow me to give up
contracting completely, should i choose to.

~~~
hnwh
mind sharing what kind of business this is? I'd like to do the same at some
point soon..

~~~
tocomment
Yes, please share. I didn't know this was possible.

~~~
komlon
This is just standard contracting where you apply for jobs that only last a
certain length of time. This isn't uncommon in the UK IT industry.

I notice some Americans will call freelancing contracting even though they
mean two very different things over here.

As a contractor, you generally have several years of experience in a
technology (let's say Oracle ATG ecommerce platform). Companies that want to
implement ATG may not want to hire a full time and permanent group of Software
Engineers as building software is not there business, instead, they will hire
a contracting firm, someone like IBM, Oracle or Accenture. These firms send
people to the client to work in the new implementation on contracts that could
last from 1 month to 12 months (for example).

Sometimes companies and consultancies will hire independent consultants (like
the parent poster) who will join a company for a just a few months / until the
project is done then they will go and join a new company so on and so forth.

Contractors generally charge per day (a good friend of mine charges £500 per
day) and they have no employee benefits.

It's a tough market but if you have the right skills (tech and otherwise) you
can earn yourself some very good money.

Some Americans think that there freelancing efforts are the same as
contracting. This may be the case in some instances but a lot of the time I
see people claiming that you don't need much experience go contracting and
it's easy work to get if you try hard etc etc. These are usually Americans
that are getting confused between the professional service offering that is
contracting and the low value informal work they do which I would call
freelancing.

EDIT: the parent just told us he was talking about a cleaning business. What I
have described is IT contracting.

~~~
TamDenholm
Yeah, exactly what you described is what i do with my main tech skillset. :)

------
mtoddh
_but taking 3 or 6 months off per year should be doable in this profession due
to the nature of the work and very high earnings._

It would be doable money-wise but I would think it would be hard to find a
company willing to go along with this arrangement- although if people know
otherwise I'd love to hear which companies offer this level of flexibility. In
the past, others have suggested using the time between jobs for this - but (in
the US at least) you'd still need to pay into COBRA if you wanted your health
insurance to continue during that time. Also, having worked through the dot-
com period at the beginning of the last decade, I'm always a little cautious
about assuming that it will be easy to land the next gig.

------
zbruhnke
For me this answer is more one of personal preference. I love what I do.

After I sold my first company I was sure I would take 5 years off and not
work, I couldn't even sit still for a month before I was itching to build
something else and soon started something new.

It's more of a lifestyle choice and my family and those around me probably
suffer a bit, but the truth is my work is my addiction. I often wake up in the
middle of the night and walk to my computer because I have just realized a
solution to the problem I was trying to work through earlier in the night.

Some people don't understand those who keep going even when they don't have
to, and I cannot speak for those who do, but in the case of myself I don't
understand those who stop.

I am constantly thinking of a better way to do something or a more efficient
method for something I have already done and I truly believe its just my
personality. If I were a high school football coach I would want to coach
college and if I were a college coach I would want to coach in the NFL.

Likewise if I were and NFL coach I would want to win superbowls. I feel the
same way about business. No matter if I have success or not I can always find
ways to improve and I constantly strive for better. My girlfriend will tell
you its a sickness and my parents will tell you they don't understand but all
I can tell you is I know no other way.

Everyone is wired differently but I truly believe entrepreneurs share some
similarities about their ways of thinking. Not all are motivated by money (see
Steve Jobs) although some are (Larry Ellison, Richard Branson) but most are
motivated by changing the status quo, making an impact on society or at least
their market and at least with most of the good ones who I have met they don't
see stopping as an option.

------
kozmikyak
I've just recently been thinking about "working" 20-30 hours a week, so I have
time to work on some projects of my own. I find there are two main obstacles
to reducing my paid "work" load.

1\. I currently rely on contract work, and I find that I don't have contacts
that want to employ a contractor for 20-30 hours a week, or even a set of
contractors who want to employ for a combined 20-30 hours a week. Usually when
people hire contractors, they want something done as soon as possible, without
distractions.

To obtain my desired work hours per week, I will have to greatly extend my
contacts list. Which I should do anyway, but it won't happen overnight.

2\. Health insurance. I have mild schizophrenia which, untreated, makes it
hard for me to reason logically. With the proper medication and care I remain
gainfully employed as a dev/sysadmin/devops role. On top of that I have
Tourette syndrome.

Insurance for anyone with these kinds of pre-existing conditions is expensive;
laws changed such that very soon they won't be able to _deny_ it to me, but
they can price it as high as they like. Despite having substantial savings,
long periods of not having any income is out of the question for me.
Therefore, either traditional corporate employment, or full-time contract work
at a high enough wage to pay for high-quality insurance, are the way to go.

I don't mention these things in a "waaaa, waaaaa, I'm so helpless" way--far
from it. I've attained more than the average person in my career, in terms of
skills and pay.

Rather, I think people on this site forget sometimes that not everyone is
suited to risk it all on a startup, and not everyone is cut out to be an
entrepreneur, and not everyone has to be an A+++++ level developer to get by,
and it's not a sin to seek some stability.

------
patio11
Many HNers do, in fact, have very non-traditional work schedules. (For roughly
the same reason why many have very non-traditional salaries. By the way, both
are probably underreported out of modesty.)

------
noodle
I'm not self-employed, so I have to follow the general guidelines laid down by
others with respect to employment. This includes working 5 days a week for the
full year.

I have other flexibilitties associated with my job, like flexible work hours,
telecommuting and open vacation policy, but it doesn't change the expectation
of me being in the office 5 days a week as a general rule of thumb.

------
daoudc
I just went from five days to three days a week in my job in industry in order
to work as a researcher the other two days. I had to take a pay cut to do so,
and I was lucky that my company was happy for me to do this.

So far, it's working out great - I do the research work from home,
occasionally commuting to uni, and it's great to have the balance of academia
and real life work.

~~~
oulipo
Were you a researcher before, or are you trying to get into research now?

~~~
daoudc
I did a PhD and a Knowledge Transfer Partnership with my current company, but
this is my first proper research job.

------
FigBug
I work anywhere from 100 to 130 hours a month. I find I don't end up doing
anything productive with the time off. I have a list of side projects I want
to do, but non have been touched.

Instead I usually ride my bike. Which is productive in it's own way, and more
the lifestyle I want anyway.

------
bryanlarsen
1) Because if I'm not working, there's a huge list of things that I should be
doing. We've got family arriving in a month for the Christmas season. If I
wasn't feel working I'd either be prepping for that or feeling guilty for not
prepping for that. Doing a certain amount of physical work is a great antidote
for the stresses of a desk job, but more than that is just work.

2) Money is addictive. My wife hates getting called for work at 3AM. But those
calls pay so well for very little work that it's hard for her to take her name
off the call list.

3) The fear that if you always say "no" to requests, you'll stop getting
requests.

------
digitalengineer
Relevant: _I think you’re all fucking mad. Deranged._ From "A Short Lesson in
Perspective. [http://www.lindsredding.com/2012/03/11/a-overdue-lesson-
in-p...](http://www.lindsredding.com/2012/03/11/a-overdue-lesson-in-
perspective/)

Your perspective is just that: _a perspective_. When his body changes (for the
worse) so does his perspective.

------
tejaswiy
Unless you're a consulting, I don't think it's really possible as a programmer
to take 3 months off every year. If I could, I would though.

------
the_bear
If I worked less, I'd want to spend the extra free time doing something
important. The problem is, I don't think there's anything I could spend my
time on that would be (a) more important than my normal work and (b) at least
as likely to succeed as my normal work. I'm much more likely to do something I
can be proud of if I put all of my time into one project rather than splitting
it between several different projects.

If work is just a thing you do for money, then minimizing the amount of time
you spend doing it makes sense. If you actually find work satisfying and care
about the results, then I think it often makes sense to devote as much time as
possible without causing yourself to stop enjoying it or become unproductive.

Having said that, I do try to reserve some time for side projects because
that's a good way to develop new skills that I can apply to my main project.

~~~
genericstorage3
"If you actually find work satisfying and care about the results, then I think
it often makes sense to devote as much time as possible without causing
yourself to stop enjoying it or become unproductive." But would you still work
(doing the same thing) if you had 100000000$?

"If I worked less, I'd want to spend the extra free time doing something
important." Why do you focus on doing important things and not what-you-like-
things?

------
commanda
I'm currently taking a break from working. This year, I've been a contract
developer, which has been very lucrative because I charge a very high hourly
rate. I can now afford to take the next few years off, depending on what city
I move to of course. Thing is, for my whole professional life, I've been a
workaholic. I used to think that it was fine for me to work so much because I
just love programming so much, but I think all those 60 hour weeks gradually
wore me down. I think I'm at the point now where I have to force myself to
chill out for a while and develop other interests in my life besides coding.
So, that's just what I'm going to do.

Luckily, I don't have children or a mortgage, but I do have a health problem
that requires me to maintain health insurance, which I pay for myself.

------
tokenadult
Do you have children?

------
xoail
My problem is, I enjoy working. Sometimes it is stressful and sometimes it's
fun. But at the end, if I am not working 3 days in a row, I literally collapse
and start freaking out. I don't mind not getting paid but what I do mind is
not working and/or learning.

------
biscarch
Keeping in mind I'm a younger, single person with no serious debt and I live
fairly frugally; I haven't taken a contract in a couple months. I'm currently
living off of the money from my last contract and working on a startup idea I
formed during my "time off". (note: I don't take time off, I love programming
too much. The time off is just from clients so I can explore things like
Monads and Macros... Mmmmm M&M's).

I find out about my YC application tomorrow, so I may not need to take client
work for awhile, If I don't get an in person interview for YC, I will probably
need to pick up a contract before January.

tldr; I do only work between 6-9 months a year or less.

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marlint111
I am working now to work less in the future. My earning power is pretty good
at the moment, and I have a side project that brings in some extra cash. Both
my wife and I live cheaply (she's about to start work as a doctor).

We're working really hard on saving now, so that when we have kids we can both
afford to go part-time, so as to not miss out on them growing up, and
hopefully retire a bit early.

We're now at the point where our returns on our savings boost our annual
income by about 10%, so slowly building up enough capital to give us that
future flexibility.

------
Nursie
I know some folks that do.

Software Engineer salaries in the UK are generally pretty good, but not really
equivalent to their US counterparts, so a lot of folks can't really afford to
do this.

As a contractor/freelancer I make more money but have a lot less security and
have to look for new contracts once in a while. I anticipate being able to
take a couple of months off each year though. The problem is that work
translates directly to income, so I could take those two months off, or I
could get that new car or pay down my mortgage by a chunk.

------
bestest
I do work less. And it's the best thing that has ever happened to me. Can't
imagine myself going back to 9-to-5. I usually work up to 4 hours a day /
night, and I do it when I really feel I'm up to it. The rest of the time is
mine. I don't need a watch. I don't need a calendar. I don't care what day of
week it is. And it's fantastic. I like to take a day or two or three or a week
or a month break now and again.

So, I suppose it's only up to finding an employer who would accept you working
like this or working for yourself. Either way is good.

------
AndrewDucker
Because I don't earn _that_ much. I earn enough to be very comfortable (around
twice median wages), but not enough to just take months off work.

Also, I enjoy large chunks of it.

~~~
maigret
Twice median wages means that you should actually be comfortably able to take
6 months off each year. Of course I understand also why you wouldn't want to
sacrifice that money for more more free time, I'm just telling this is a
decision more than a pure need.

~~~
AndrewDucker
This is only true if I'm living in either a median-priced city (which
Edinburgh is not) or a low-priced home in a more expensive city (which,
frankly, are not nice).

I could certainly take the time off, if I was willing to share a flat with
other people rather than owning my own home - but dividing my wages in half
would make my mortgage completely unaffordable - and the kind of mortgage I
could afford would then have me living miles away from work and commuting long
distances. Or living in horribly deprived areas.

Your statement assumes that the median wage produces a reasonable standard of
living for everyone, no matter where in the country they live, and that's
simply not true.

------
lnanek2
I enjoy writing every day around the clock anyway. If I write on my own it's a
hack, it I team up with a designer, it's a good looking hack, if I team up
with a company I have designers, marketing, testers, servers/clouds, a large
user base, a brand, etc. - so you can see why I often prefer to write for a
company anyway. Throw in equity, options, rev shares...well then I'm improving
something I own any time I put extra time in anyway, not just going for a
bigger bonus.

------
annelie
In my old job I was longing after more time off and more time to do other
things. Yet I was spending about 2* 3 weeks abroad every year.

Now however, I do not feel the same need for this. I love my job, I get to do
some (not meeting intense) travelling with it and I love the people I work
with and what I do. Basically I don't my job is what I do for fun.

That's why I work more now.

------
bhousel
I do work less. I don't think it's unusual for consultants. But my neighbors,
family, and other people in my life definitely think it's weird.

------
davewasthere
I work 6-9 months each year, taking at least 3 months off for creative
projects/travelling.

Easiest way to do this was reduce expenses. When I was with my ex, I lived on
about 90% of earnings. Being single (for most of the last 5 years) I've been
living off a lot less, but with a lot more travelling. (normally around
35-40%, but last financial year was 50% as I had six months off)

------
timjahn
Money runs the world (whether we like it/acknowledge it or not).

If you have enough money, you can do such a thing. If you don't, you're a bit
more restricted.

Throwing in some kids, house, family, health issues, whatever compounds it,
but at the end of the day, the more money the better.

------
yen223
Because I would have trouble paying the bills. The demand for software
engineers in Malaysia is...lacking.

------
raphinou
I went back to university and had to work less as a consequence. I'm very
happy of my decision.

Of course, my earnings took a serious hit, and that's probably the biggest
reason only few people do work less. But I consider it was worth it!

------
mknappen
The "work" is always consistent. Should I work less on a high paying gig I
will fill the time with personal or less profitable projects of interest.
Savings make the periodic transitions mostly seamless and life a through
enjoyment.

------
ojbyrne
If you look at top movie actors, they also seem to work themselves to death,
while earning absurd amounts of money. Why? Because their career has a huge
potential for a short shelf life.

I believe it's the same thing in software.

------
brador
I just like working.

Eternal vacation/hobby projects with no gain sound awesome until you actually
do it. It get's boring fast. I lasted 4 weeks in to my early retirement before
I just had to do something.

------
Mamady
Because I love this shit. Working hard makes me proud of myself. Relaxing and
taking holidays actually makes me feel guilty about being 'lazy'. The harder I
work, the better I feel. It's weird.

------
netcan
a - Because I don't make that much money

b - Because it's not an easily available option. It's not impossible but
having this kind of a "requirement" would be pretty limiting.

------
canadiancreed
Oddly enough I'm trying to work more so I can do three months off/pay off
debts. Dont' think I'd want to work less then I currently do.

------
clueless123
Some of us do :)

------
Dirlewanger
Because working in a flourishing start-up/hoping to strike it rich/etc etc
blah blah blah.

------
colmvp
Because I don't have a girlfriend and houses don't pay for themselves.

------
hapless
Because part-time employees don't get health insurance.

------
modernsisyphus
Stay at home wife and two kids in private school...

------
vraylle
Insurance. At least, until 2014.

------
Buzaga
40hrs a week, bad location with a bad market, even worse for one that tries to
be into ruby, innovation instead of the 'common path', have some debt

\+ some more 18hrs a week of trying to grow out of the 40hrs+debt... can't
work less otherwise it means dropping the tombstone on the dream of a
satisfying life(moving to another country or bigger economic centers here
could do too but health issues in family impede me). Sucks.

