
Some companies in Sweden are testing a six-hour work day - aarghh
http://www.fastcoexist.com/3051448/why-sweden-is-shifting-to-a-6-hour-work-day
======
jontro
As a swede I think the title is highly misleading. Sweden is not shifting to a
6-hour workday. Sure there are a few experiments but the baseline is that
sweden (which has a huge public sector) cannot afford it without raising taxes
further.

The current forecasts for the future indicates that taxes has to be raised a
lot just to maintain the current standard. I would be very surprised if the 6
hour workday would be prominent here in the future.

~~~
xlm1717
As an American, I'm interested in knowing why it would require Sweden to raise
taxes. Since you mentioned a huge public sector, is it a case of needing extra
workers to work shifts so that pubic services are run at the usual hours?

I imagine private companies would be able to get away with it, as long as all
their competitors also switch to six-hour workdays.

~~~
jontro
From just a quick googling around I've seen estimated costs for a 30 hour
work-week the public budget between 86 [1] - 236 [2] billion SEK/year. The
total budget last year year was 862 billion. Somewhere that money has to come
from

Some Swedish links about it: [1]: [http://www.etc.se/inrikes/sa-tycker-
oppositionen-om-sextimma...](http://www.etc.se/inrikes/sa-tycker-oppositionen-
om-sextimmarsdagen)

[2]: [http://www.expressen.se/nyheter/val2014/sa-mycket-kostar-
fis...](http://www.expressen.se/nyheter/val2014/sa-mycket-kostar-fis-forslag-
att-genomfora/)

~~~
jontro
Here's some more facts about the public sector. Translated from:
[http://www.scb.se/Statistik/_Publikationer/OE0903_2014A01_BR...](http://www.scb.se/Statistik/_Publikationer/OE0903_2014A01_BR_OE06BR1401.pdf)

Different measures of government size, 2012. Percentage of GDP.

Public authorities' share of the total value added: 18%

Public sector consumption and investments: 30%

Employed in the public sector: 28%

Employed in the public sector and public enterprises 33%

General government expenditure 51%

General government revenue 50%

------
alkonaut
This hasn't been in the news in Sweden a lot, there is nothing "official"
going on and I doubt that a fraction of a percent of those with a 40h week
today will have anything else in a year or two. The headline (both in the
source and here) should read "a couple of companies and public employers in
Sweden are testing a 6-hour work day".

Nothing to see here.

~~~
ersii
And it might be worth knowing that the two mentioned companies (Filimundus AB,
M Brath AB) in the article - each have about 10 employees, according to 2014
official records.

I'd say that it's quite hard to extrapolate that the whole country is going
the same way as these two companies.

~~~
alkonaut
Parts of some large municipalities and hospitals (City of Gothemburg, for
example) are trying it at a much larger scale than these companies, and the
results will be much more interesting. It's still not widespread though.

------
belorn
It is not mentioned in the article but a many places has also opted to
implemented a 2 team shift. This mean that instead of having production during
8 hrs each day and seeing significant drop in production during the later
hours, they instead got 12 hr of very effective workers. One hospital that did
this has reported significant increase in number of surgeries, decrease in
mistakes, few'er sick days, lower turnover rate, and easier time to recruit.
The doubling in employees are paid not by taxes but instead with higher
efficiency, and as such we might not need to build new hospitals in a while if
this was implemented as a national policy.

------
lovemetender
I've found that working 8 or 9 months during the year then taking 3 or 4
months to look for the next contract or FT job helps me to re-sync and avoid
burn-out (at least, I don't think I'm burned out - that's a good sign right!).

~~~
t0mk
way to go! I try the same, but when I stop working and chill for a while, I
start to feel guilty for not making more money despite I could.

Maybe a personal year-income-threshold would be a good idea. Once that's
earned, just relax. Makes more sense in countries with progressive income tax
rate.

~~~
throwaway7767
> Maybe a personal year-income-threshold would be a good idea. Once that's
> earned, just relax. Makes more sense in countries with progressive income
> tax rate.

Isn't a progressive income tax usually applied monthly? In that case, not
working for some calendar months is hurting your income.

At least where I am, we have progressive income tax, and if I did this I would
end up paying more in taxes for the same amount of work, as for 3 months I
would not use any of my lower-tier income tax, and the rest of the year I
would be paying more to the higher tiers than if I balanced things evenly over
the year.

I guess you could make a deal with your employer to split your payments across
the inactive months, not sure if there are some legal issues with that.

One of the many ways tax systems can create weird incentives, as this actually
sounds like a pretty nice arrangement.

~~~
maxerickson
The US withholds taxes based on the amounts in the paycheck, but the actual
tax is figured on annual income, so you either get the money back or given a
predictable annual income, adjust the withholding (there is some risk of
getting penalized for owing too much, so the predictable part matters).

~~~
lovemetender
Correct, this is in the US and in fact to the parent, we found we end up not
with much less in our account making 80K instead of 120K. I suppose maybe if
you go above 150K it might be better, not sure about that though.

------
allendoerfer

      Filimundus switched to a six-hour day last year, and says that
      the change hasn't really made a major difference in how people
      work. The leadership team just asked people to stay off social
      media and personal distractions, and eliminated some standard
      weekly meetings.
    

Might work for a company with a good culture, but betting on people to be
grateful and voluntarily improve their work ethic works only as long as all
the others still have the 8h workday.

------
it_learnses
Can't wait till this happens in North America. I hope we realize shorter work
days and basic income in the next couple of decades. Then we will truly have a
golden age.

~~~
Havoc
I fully expect the US to be the very last to switch.

~~~
skwirl
I'm kind of Ok with letting other countries try this one out first. I'm
receptive to the idea of basic income, but the potential unintended
consequences seem terrifying.

~~~
nickff
If anyone is to try this, the states are ideal candidates. People can (and do)
vote with their feet when states implement negative policies, which is one
reason they are "laboratories of democracy". In addition, it is clear that
they have the consitutional authority to do this (while the federal government
does not).

~~~
skwirl
It feels like something that would fail if only one state did it. A lot of low
income people would move to that state for basic income and the high income
people seeing massive tax increases would leave. Then the system would
collapse.

At a country level it is much more difficult for people to come and go and
countries have some control over who does come and go. It would be better
tried by some European country.

------
eimai134
This is a great idea - people waste so much time at work that if they only
worked 6 hours they might get more done, and have a better quality of life,
leading them to be more productive when they are there.

------
jamesblonde
As an expat.living in Sweden with kids, there's a lot of social pressure to
not leave your kids in childcare longer than 8 hrs. If both caregivers don't
have flexitime, 6 hrs would be very attractive to IT workers here. Both male
and female.

------
tonomics
Standardizing work always leads to problems.

Some individuals need 3 hours, others 12 hours. The only question is whether
the job is done.

~~~
lfowles
And sometimes I need 6 hours in the office to finish the day in a 2 hour blaze
of glory

------
ersii
It might be worth noting that the two companies (Filimundus AB, M Brath AB)
mentioned in the article both have about 10 employees each, according to
official records from 2014. Both companies have been running since
approximately 2011.

I think it's pretty safe to say that "Sweden" is not moving to a 6 hour work
day yet. This is two, incredibly small companies that are doing so.

If it was Ericsson AB or any of the industrial companies (Sandvik, SCA, Volvo,
SSAB ie Swedish Steel) however...

------
alkonaut
One of the reasons why Swedes find it most necessary to push for this (they
don't to any large extent, but when countries do, Swedes will be among the
first) is that we don't do 9-5, we do 8-5 (white collar) or 7-4 (blue collar)
because we have 45-60 minutes of unpaid lunch break. As a swede, the term
"9-5" sounds like a holiday really!

------
err4nt
While I agree that an arbitrary eight-hour work day may not suit every task
the best, I don't see why switching it to six hours is any less arbitrary.

As a self-employed person my pay _directly_ correlates to the amount of hours
I grind away. I actively try to make my working time more efficient, but
cutting down on hours wouldn't get me anywhere.

Why not advocate that shifts be of a length required by the task alone and not
a preset amount of time each day?

~~~
PascLeRasc
Because it's mentally taxing to work for eight hours straight for many if not
most people. Knowledge work ([http://calnewport.com/blog/2012/11/21/knowledge-
workers-are-...](http://calnewport.com/blog/2012/11/21/knowledge-workers-are-
bad-at-working-and-heres-what-to-do-about-it/)) does not scale linearly with
time, even over the course of a workday.

~~~
err4nt
I find I work best in two sprints less than 6 hours, I totally get that long
sprints reach a point of diminishing returns. My question is Why is six hours
so much better than abandoning shift-based timing for something like task-
based timing instead and cutting out all that extra time, not just reduce it.

------
_Codemonkeyism
I would like to try out a 10h workday with 4days/week and a 3 day weekend.
Some studies say a 3 day weekend makes you happier and more productive.

~~~
perfunctory
why 10h? go ahead with 4 days but keep 8h.

~~~
anon4
1\. Employers want to get 40h work out of every employee

2\. Employees don't want to take a 20% cut to their salary

~~~
perfunctory
It's all a matter of negotiation, isn't it. You never get what you never ask
for.

~~~
_Codemonkeyism
No success yet, but if you find a company that pays a CTO with 4x8h give me a
call.

------
l0stb0y
I probably work about 10 hours per week, offsetting that by basically being
available 24-7 if needed. Luckily, that's very rare. I guarantee my workload
and quality of work excels my coworkers who are in the office 40+ hours a
week. The 40 hour work week is totally ineffective for most industries but,
alas, America would never move away from it.

------
perfunctory
I personally always negotiate for 4days a week. Works wonderfully for me.

------
apapli
..and they established they were 25% less productive.

------
anon4
The majority of people have children. Sucks for you, but I'd rather it suck
for you and the rest of the few asshole asocial hermits, than suck for all of
us. Though if you like money so much, maybe we could pass in a law that you
can trade in your fertility for a tax cut.

~~~
monstruoso
I second the other comment. Fuck you, just, fuck you.

~~~
dang
Please follow the HN guidelines and remain civil, even when the other person
has not.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html)

