
Why do people waste so much time at work? - fredley
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-32829232
======
Foomandoonian
"We must do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to
earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a
technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of
today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living.
We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be
employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian-Darwinian
theory, he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of
inspectors and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors.
__The true business of people should be to go back to school and think about
whatever it was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told
them they had to earn a living. __" \-- Buckminster Fuller, 1930

~~~
floppydisk
We tried this idea, in America, at the Jamestown Colony. They initially
established it in a "socialist" vein wherein everyone received an equal share
of the proceeds (food, etc) regardless of their contributions to the colony.
The colony barely survived because people lacked the incentive to work and
produce because there was no advantage to them working more than their peers.
Why should I work to produce an excess when Billy Bob sits on the dock all day
and receives the same share I do. When they lifted the socialist mandate on
redistribution, production at the colony skyrocketed because people were
rewarded for their effort.

Everyone has to put a roof over their head and food in their belly. If we
create a culture that tells people they don't have to work to receive those
benefits, it will disicentivize people to actually work (why should they if
their excess production goes to subsidizing non-producers who stare at the sky
all day?) and engage in production activities. Supporting a society
necessitates producers create more than what they need, but if you create a
system that takes what it deems the excess from the producers without
compensation or reward and doles it out, the producers will stop producing and
we'll back at Jamestown all over again.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
There was nothing "socialist" about Jamestown. Many of the initial settlers
were aristocrats who had no experience of work, and no interest in it.

Unsurprisingly this didn't end well.

>If we create a culture that tells people they don't have to work to receive
those benefits, it will disicentivize people to actually work.

We already have a culture like this. Those who believe they own an entirely
imaginary thing called "money" believe they're entitled to live off the
efforts who don't.

It would take an outbreak of unreasonable optimism to claim this is the most
efficient and productive of all possible systems - especially considering it's
notorious for its many completely predictable failure modes.

~~~
300bps
_Those who believe they own an entirely imaginary thing called "money"_

The fact that someone can write this is laughable to anyone that was ever poor
in their life.

Money is not at all imaginary. It's quite real. The lack of money can ruin
your day, your year, your life.

As for what money is - it is a productivity storage mechanism. Once you've
been productive it allows you to store that productivity in a fungible form.
It allows you to exchange that stored productivity for the productivity of
others, give it away to someone else or basically do anything you want with
it.

~~~
juliangregorian
The fact that anyone was ever poor should be an affront to anyone who believes
that money is real. People of your ilk are fond of resorting to the old canard
"everyone needs a roof over their head and food in their belly". Well, there
quite simply is an astounding surplus of such. Those who really believe that
the lottery system we currently use of assigning who gets what is truly
effective and just will have to answer for that someday.

Money is only powerful because a quorum of people have mutually agreed to
believe that it is. One of the things I enjoy pointing out is that the stock
market is a wonderful example of the power of belief. When enough people
believe it's going to crash, guess what happens?

~~~
Drakim
What I feel many people miss is that goods and money are not synonyms. If
there was a huge influx of money into the world, that helps exactly nobody
because the amount of food, shelter and other goods has not increased.

I find that people "get" this a lot easier when you start talking about
coupons and IOU instead of gold and dollars. Nobody believes that the guy who
is moving coupons back and forth between various piles with specific timing
has truly earned the load of goods he gains. Instead, they rightly feel like
he is cheating the system and taking without giving back.

But in the real world, tons of people do tricks with money and get filthy rich
from it, and that's just them "working smart". Meanwhile, somebody had to grow
that potato, the actual tangible good, that he ate for dinner. What did he
give back in return?

~~~
juliangregorian
Sure, and that reminds me of another great example for money's imaginary
quality: The total amount of money in existence is many magnitudes more than
it would theoretically take to end global poverty. However, no one dares
attempt this, because it would knock the struts out that prop up the whole
system (namely, debt).

~~~
dragonwriter
> The total amount of money in existence is many magnitudes more than it would
> theoretically take to end global poverty.

No quantity of money can end poverty, and no reasonable theory suggests that
any amount of money can.

Systems of distributing goods and services (whether or not money is used as a
proxy in those systems) might, but the quantity of money existing is pretty
much irrelevant to that.

> However, no one dares attempt this, because it would knock the struts out
> that prop up the whole system (namely, debt).

Money _is_ debt. Even commodity money -- as long as it is being traded not to
be used for its intrinsic properties but for future exchange -- is essentially
being used to separate the two sides of a barter transaction so that you don't
need to exchange things of direct use such that the money then becomes, in
effect, a marker of debt from the whole of the money-using society to the
money holder.

So, yes, "debt" is the foundation on which the whole system of money is built
because debt is what money is (modern fiat currency represents the abandonment
of even the pretense that there is something else to it, as that pretense has
always been costly to the function of money.) But if you think you can
rearrange money to achieve some goal _without_ maintaining its nature as debt,
you don't understand money at all.

~~~
juliangregorian
> No quantity of money can end poverty

What definition of poverty are you using? Certainly studies have been done:
[https://www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/pressreleases/2013-01-19/...](https://www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/pressreleases/2013-01-19/annual-
income-richest-100-people-enough-end-global-poverty-four)

> the quantity of money existing is pretty much irrelevant to that.

I mean, that's what I'm saying, but as it is now, if I had a billion dollars,
I could build a few wells in Africa, yanno?

> Money is debt...

Clearly, but in addition to that, my point is that the system of money needs
people to be in debt. There's no "neutral state" as it were, and indeed, many
of the efforts of the IMF and World Bank are calculated to get poor countries
further in debt.

------
sitkack
Because if they got their job done and left they would be fired. If they got
their job done, they would be given more work. So one takes the maximal amount
of time to do a task given the requirement that they be in the office for 8+
hrs a day.

~~~
exizt88
If they have 8 hours of work time and finished their tasks in 6, does that
mean they have exhausted their usefulness to the business? Why not spend these
2 hours doing some small miscellaneous tasks?

~~~
FLUX-YOU
>Why not spend these 2 hours doing some small miscellaneous tasks?

Because that's scope creep and it can create the expectation that it's part of
my job, so then I'll be responsible for it. Down the line, if one of those
misc tasks becomes the ire of someone else and my name is attached to it
(comment, commit, etc.), they'll contact me further down the line, perhaps
when I'm dealing with something of my own. Then, at least, I have to explain
that I don't maintain that and in the worst case (which has happened), I have
to fight to not be responsible for it right then.

There's a balance in having your name associated with 'things' in a business.
Some people might be good at being a know-it-all, being well-known, and
handling everything (why aren't they running their own company?), but you'll
increase your chances of interruption the more wide-spread your name is.

~~~
omouse
Yep exactly. Try adding unit tests to legacy code when your coworkers
consistently ignore it. They'll be praised as fast workers who kinda sorta get
the job done. All you'll get is called out for being slow and be tasked with
fixing someone else's mess and your code won't be a maintenance burden.

It feels like in software dev we can just make messes and move on without
accepting responsibility. Increasing scope on yourself with those small misc.
tasks also means accepting more responsibility than most software devs accept
which makes you a target when things don't go smoothly either through your
fault or someone else's.

The biggest catch is that those 2 hours that you have butt in seat means you
can't work on your own skills/side project for fear of the employer owning the
code. The only thing you can do is take online courses at Coursera or Udemy as
they're general enough skills.

------
boothead
I'm reading this at the moment:

[http://www.reinventingorganizations.com/](http://www.reinventingorganizations.com/)

Some extracts from the intro:

"And it’s not only at the bottom of the pyramid. There is a dirty secret I
have discovered in the fifteen years I have spent consulting and coaching
organizational leaders: life at the top of the pyramids isn’t much more
fulfilling. Behind the façade and the bravado, the lives of powerful corporate
leaders are ones of quiet suffering too. Their frantic activity is often a
poor cover up for a deep inner sense of emptiness. The power games, the
politics, and the infighting end up taking their toll on everybody. At both
the top and bottom, organizations are more often than not playfields for
unfulfilling pursuits of our egos, inhospitable to the deeper yearnings of our
souls.

This book isn’t a rant about large corporations gone mad with greed. People
who work in government agencies or nonprofits are rarely more exuberant about
their workplaces. Even professions of calling aren’t immune to organizational
disillusionment. Teachers, doctors, and nurses are leaving their field of
vocation in droves. Our schools, unfortunately, are for the most part soulless
machines where students and teachers simply go through the motions. We have
turned hospitals into cold, bureaucratic institutions that dispossess doctors
and nurses of their capacity to care from the heart. "

"The way we try to deal with organizations’ current problems often seems to
make things worse, not better. Most organizations have gone through many
rounds of change programs, mergers, centralizations and decentralizations, new
IT systems, new mission statements, new scorecards, or new incentive systems.
It feels like we have stretched the current way we run organizations to its
limits, and these traditional recipes often seem part of the problem, not the
solution.

We yearn for more, for radically better ways to be in organizations. But is
that genuinely possible, or mere wishful thinking? If it turns out that it is
possible to create organizations that draw out more of our human potential,
then what do such organizations look like? How do we bring them to life? These
are the questions at the heart of this book. "

~~~
rorykoehler
Also reading this. Great book.

------
normloman
Before we get into a discussion about basic income and drones making us
obsolete, can we talk about cutting hours? First, lets get back to the
standard 40 hour work week. That'd be a big step. And after that, can some of
us work less? Half of my day is spent browsing the internet out of boredom.
I'd get more done if the day was shorter. Better yet, let me telecommute and
set my own hours. You'll get the same results out of me, if not better, and
I'll be a happier fellow.

~~~
winter_blue
I totally relate to you. I'd myself personally prefer going half-time (20
hrs/week), with the option of working extra hours. (Perhaps a 5-hours-a-day
4-day work week.)

------
Uberphallus
In my case it's the lack of documentation about a huge system (ecosystem, I'd
rather call it), in contrast to an overengineered methodology and process,
which involves mandatory code reviews by people unfamiliar with the code and 6
test phases before production.

If I crank 10 lines of code a week I consider myself lucky, and it won't take
less than 3 weeks for them to hit production.

The combination of that with long builds and releases (30min minimum) makes me
always have something to do, but I'm always waiting for something to be able
to move on (build to be finished, answers from experts, validation by QA...).
That's where HN and r/programming kick in.

~~~
mdpopescu
I sincerely hope this (10 lines of code a week) is hyperbole. I would be fine
with 3 weeks to hit production - not everybody works on a SaaS, I've had six
months release cycles - but... not writing code?

~~~
marktangotango
I've probably not even gotten 10 lines a week at some jobs. One gig was mostly
all ad hoc reporting stuff, with a lot of cut and paste of previous impls.
Another place I and two others spent a year on a project that should've taken
2 months, I didn't write any new code at all for at least 6 months of that
project. Specifically there was a lot of back forth, requirements changes from
the business owners, on the part I wasn't involved with, before the project
went live.

This was typical for the first 10 years of my career until I took a lead
position. Now I work all the time, and I focus on organizing and coaching up
my team so I don't have to do as much.

------
caseysoftware
I think this involves setting some clear boundaries and expectations. I
learned some things while I was consulting that I've carried into everything
since:

\- After a certain time each evening (7pm for me), stop sending email. You can
still write and respond to it but schedule it to go out the next morning. If
people see you respond at 2am, they'll begin to expect it.

\- Do the same for weekends. Schedule email for Monday morning. If people see
you respond on Saturdays, they'll begin to expect it.

\- Only check email every N hours. I've found N=3 or 4 is best. This is the
hardest for me. If you respond to every email in minutes, they'll begin to
expect it.

\- If you're not explicitly on the To line, filter it from your inbox. I have
an "other stuff" folder where email goes if I'm not explicitly on the To line.
I check this folder 1-2 times/day at most. If something is important to me,
address it to me.

\- Have a fixed todo list each day. If someone brings you a task, put it at
the end of today so it often ends up tomorrow and communicate that.
(Obviously, if something is _really_ important, you can shift the order but
that should be an exception, not the practice.) If you drop everything every
time someone asks, they'll begin to expect it.

\- Leave the office at a predictable time each day. I try to leave by 6pm. If
you occasionally stay late, they'll begin to expect it.

\- Don't answer your phone the first time someone calls. I always wait until
their second call or if they email/text/dm too. If you're always-accessible,
they'll begin to expect it.

\- Don't take your phone into the bedroom at night. I leave mine charging on
my desk at the other side of the house. If you answer your phone in the middle
of the night, they'll begin to expect it.

~~~
caseysoftware
I should note two extra benefits from not always being available:

\- many problems often resolve themselves

\- those people who would rather ask someone instead of google, tend to learn
to google.

------
webtards
Because we are playing the game. Some call it presenteeism, other call it face
time, some even view it as the boss owning your ass during the work hours. But
basically, we don't really give a fuck for the organisation, for the team, for
the project, for the job. We just do enough to keep the gig until something
better rolls along. We know you would have no hesitation to cut jobs and other
such when it suits, so don't expect any more from us.

------
nshepperd
> In this respect, entire occupations might be considered phoney - from life
> coaches to "atmosphere co-ordinators" (people hired to create a party vibe
> in bars) to "chief learning officers" in the corporate world.

People hired to create atmosphere in bars might be "phoney" in an object-level
sense, but as far as their job goes presumably they do provide an actual
service to someone, by causing more people to visit the bar.

~~~
davidgerard
It's still a Bullshit Job. [http://strikemag.org/bullshit-
jobs/](http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/)

The answer to the BBC news story's question is: "because our jobs increasingly
have more and more bullshit."

~~~
Anderkent
People creating a vibe in pubs doesn't feel like a bullshit job. They're
providing a service to other pub goers, making it a more pleasant place.

You can't ignore pleasure and satisfaction of other people when considering a
job is useful or not. In the end, those are the goals of anything we do; that
the job does it directly rather than indirectly (by say improving industry,
which makes life easier, which means people have more free time, which
provides happiness/satisfaction) doesn't make it 'bullshit'

~~~
davidgerard
I would disagree. Emotional labour is the essence of many a completely
bullshit job.

~~~
matt_s
The pub should A/B test having the person there, and not there, and look at
the bar sales. That would determine if it is bullshit or not.

If the person creates a vibe that gets more people there, e.g. patrons texting
friends to stop in, or increased bar sales by people staying longer then it
might be worth it.

Of course if the bar hired bartenders that created an atmosphere of fun whilst
doing their jobs then that would be even more profitable.

------
erikb
I don't think it was ever different. The idea that there should be enough time
to sleep and have hobbies, that's the new thing. Just because our parents
already experienced these privileges doesn't mean it's an old topic.

And if something like this happens so regularly, so naturally, I think instead
of logically arguing about it we should worry more about how to handle that.
I'm thinking about that other article were sales people were working together
to make it looks like they all would work 80 hour weeks.

Last but not least let's not forget that our bosses also actually don't care
abut our work hours. Caring would mean that they would need to look at hour
work schedules and time tables, etc, instead of going to the golf club. For
them it's more important that they can make a good impression on their bosses
and customers as well. As long as we deliver that impression they don't mind
that we all act like we are working 80 hour weeks, including them.

------
aapje
We all know the answer is HN.

~~~
sgift
HN time is not wasted.

~~~
Roritharr
[citation needed]

~~~
sz4kerto
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9603608](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9603608)

------
GBond
I'm surprised no one mentioned Holacracy yet.

As others have mentioned, doing "just enough" work is a by-product of a
inefficiencies of the hierarchal approach of managing via command and control.
Holacracy instead is network centric.

I don't know if I completely buy into the effectiveness of Holacracy but I can
see how it it is better motivating to Producers. For example, I tend to write
better code knowing that it will be peer-reviewed by another dev I respect.

------
izietto
Because working hours are inhuman.

------
pinaceae
because I pay you for 40h of productivity per week, not a fixed amount of
output? for the latter, consulting/freelance exists.

if you get paid for 40h per week, the expectation is to devote those hours to
the benefit of the employer. do your tasks, if you have time to spare, think
of other benefits - improvements, better ideas, learn, etc.

people that finish a task and then wait to be given another are the bane of
the workplace. you never hire them at startups, but at some size they creep in
and kill, kill, kill any company. walk into HP, Oracle, IBM today and you'll
see them, in droves. that is why you can lay off 30% workforce at that size
with no sizeable impact on your customers.

~~~
Lawtonfogle
Are you paying hourly or salary? If salary, you are paying for what should be
able to be done in 40 hours a week, but if it takes 45, you expect it to still
be done, no? So if one can get it done is 35, why do you expect 5 more hours
to given free?

~~~
pinaceae
No, I pay for 40h of your attention. for things that don't fit into 40h there
is either (paid) overtime or hiring, depending on frequency.

~~~
Lawtonfogle
So you don't hire exempt employees?

------
robg
Stress makes the brain lose focus.

