
People in these countries work the longest hours according to OECD - To_soo
https://blog.kickresume.com/2018/04/23/countries-work-long-hours/
======
Grangar
I don't think these statistics are correct. People in the Netherlands
supposedly work 27 hours/week according to this data, whereas 36-40 hours is
the common standard here. Even accounting for vacations et cetera that is
terribly low.

Also from the data source: "The data are intended for comparisons of trends
over time; they are unsuitable for comparisons of the level of average annual
hours of work for a given year, because of differences in their sources and
method of calculation." The data is unsuitable for this article.

~~~
lucideer
Netherlands has (one of?) the highest rates of part time work, which would
explain this disparity if you're thinking only of full time norms.

> _The data is unsuitable for this article_

That disclaimer is primarily dissuading comparing a single year across
countries, which is reasonable (studies are usually performed within different
time periods). The data is, as stated, perfectly suitable for identifying
trends.

~~~
em500
> That disclaimer is primarily dissuading comparing a single year across
> countries,

which is of course the entire content of the article.

The data source (OECD) isn't blameless either: the default/main view of the
data ([https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-
worked.htm](https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm)) shows exactly what
their disclaimer says you shouldn't do.

~~~
lucideer
The content of the article looks at trends: it looks at productivity in
countries _tending_ to be at one end of the hours worked scale versus
productivity of countries at the other. Comparing a Mexico and Costa Rica
directly wouldn't work but looking at the tendency for those countries to
trend toward one side of the scale does.

~~~
em500
Those are not trends, which are comparisons for the same country over multiple
years. What the article does and what you're describing are cross-country
comparisons in a single year, just at the opposing tails of the distribution.

~~~
lucideer
> _Those are not trends, which are comparisons for the same country over
> multiple years_

I think you may be choosing an arbitrarily narrow definition of the word
"trend".

A typical definition[0] is "an inclination in a particular direction"

[0]
[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/trend](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/trend)

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vegardx
Hard to read an article when they beg you to subscribe to their webpage ever
single time you scroll, even as little as one pixel, down.

~~~
tluyben2
Yes, that is the one of the more annoying things I have seen. Cannot imagine
people signing up to this with this kind of horrible in your face UI.

~~~
sofayam
Pretty much chased me away. Then I came here just so I could bitch about it.
Content suicide.

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geospeck
Greece has the 4th position. Quite interesting since they've got the
reputation of being lazy.

~~~
Paul_S
Not a comment on Greece but time spent in the office doesn't equate to amount
of work done.

~~~
donquichotte
In some cultures, napping during worktime is also common. It may even show
that you are a dedicated, hard worker, getting some well-deserved rest.

~~~
rjvbk
In what cultures exactly?

~~~
dogma1138
Anecdotally Japan but I don’t know how common it is.

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ezoe
As a Japanese, The author took the average number without considering the
situation. The article said Japanese has average work time of 1,713 hours per
year. Not much Japanese people work like that. There are either over-worked
full-time workers or under-worked part-time workers.

Full-time workers work more than 2000 hours per year. part-time workers work
about 1100 hours per year. The ratio of pert-time workers are increasing
that's decreasing the average work time in Japan.

You see, there aren't many Japanese work 1700 hours per year. Just a over-
working anti-productive workers and under-working poor workers who can't find
the full-time job for some reason(school, child, tax, disability)

Bogus article.

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purplejuice
It almost convinced me that much more you work, less you produce... That's not
true. The simple reality is that more developed countries don't need many
hours of work, since they design products or run services (eg. financial).. so
that poor countries are smashed with over-hours on manufacturing, logistic,
etc.. The typical world order..

It actually happens in my company.. The coders are the ones who work more, and
the ones who earn less - So.. apparently managers are the most productive
here.

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stared
How do they gather data? Officially reported by employers or self-reported?
Both of them can have huge biases, from both intended and unintended reasons.

(Plus, in office job often there is no clear cut. People can be Facebooking
(or HNing :)) in their working hours... or on top of 8h/day it may be quite a
few hours of emails and stuff people are expected to do remotely.)

And what is the main impact on the total number of working hours? (Part-time
jobs? Holidays? Parental leaves? Sick leaves?)

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hmexx
Previous discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17450801](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17450801)

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philliphaydon
I don't trust the data at all.

Japan is too low on the list, it should be up next to Korea as they pretty
much have the same work ethic of not leaving the office before the boss.

~~~
kijin
Koreans are fairly outspoken about their own problems. They make a big fuss
about having to work long hours and not being paid enough for it. A new law
just came into effect that makes it illegal to employ someone for more than 52
hours per week (with various exceptions), so there's been even more fuss about
it lately.

In Japan, the first rule of overtime is that you don't talk about overtime.
Especially not to a researcher from an international organization who might
badmouth your country.

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eeZah7Ux
What is the second chart?

Where are links to sources and methodology?

~~~
politelemon
Definitely finding that second chart confusing. The Y-Axis on both sides goes
to 100. Are they the same metric (redundant) or different ones? And of course
the bigger question is, what is it depicting? The preceding paragraph isn't
helping in terms of context.

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kulu2002
I think they completely forgot India

~~~
makepanic
India isn't part of the OECD which means they don't have any data about it.

See
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OECD#Current_members](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OECD#Current_members)

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drawkbox
Germany has the best configuration regarding work/life balance as usual.

When you are overworked you are too tired long term to create productivity
improvements. When you can work less or make improvements to help you work
less, you have a reason to create tools, processes, systems to work faster and
more efficient.

Example: if you worked 65 hours resulting in 40 hours of actual work, there is
little time for building systems and tools that help you, if you are working
35 hours and actually working 30ish then you have lots of thinking time and
you actually work more when in work mode.

Humans need thinking time in their work, nearly all innovations come from
problems found at work, where there is time to create long term solutions.

I believe even rote tedious labor can be creative and lead to innovation as
long at there is time for open and closed modes as John Cleese puts it. [1]

> _We 've become fascinated by the fact that we can usually describe the way
> in which people function at work in terms of two modes: open and closed._

> _So what i can just add now is that creativity is not possible in the closed
> mode. By the "closed mode" I mean the mode that we are in most of the time
> when {we are} at work._

> _It 's a mode in which we're very purposeful, and it's a mode in which we
> can get very stressed and even a bit manic, but not creative._

> _By contrast, the open mode, is relaxed… expansive… less purposeful mode… in
> which we 're probably more contemplative, more inclined to humor (which
> always accompanies a wider perspective) and, consequently, more playful._

> _It 's a mood in which curiosity for its own sake can operate because we're
> not under pressure to get a specific thing done quickly. We can play, and
> that is what allows our natural creativity to surface._

> _When Alexander Fleming had the thought that led to the discovery of
> penicillin, he must have been in the open mode._

> _But let me make one thing quite clear: we need to be in the open mode when
> we 're pondering a problem but once we come up with a solution, we must then
> switch to the closed mode to implement it._

Germany with their low working hours, allows more thinking, open modes and
creativity, that leads to productivity improvements for closed mode work.

The US system has efficiently worked out creativity and input from lower
levels, more hours at work in closed mode and the uppers get to creatively
move the resources around the board but are actually failing to grasp that
they are missing half the equation, the open mode and creativity. They want
their workers in closed mode while they are open to come up with efficiencies
based on metrics, that misses whole swaths of knowledge from the actual work
process and creativity that could be innovating to productivity improvements.
The worker also finds little joy in an always closed mode job. Even if the job
is a closed only mode job, less hours can lead to open modes that allow
improvement even away from the work.

[1] [https://genius.com/John-cleese-lecture-on-creativity-
annotat...](https://genius.com/John-cleese-lecture-on-creativity-annotated)

