Skip to main content

Why not work even longer?

My wife and I currently work about 3 days per week. Even just typing that feels like a rebellious act in a society that herds us towards five days a week of work.

My wife was recently doing one of those "graduate outcomes" surveys that the university arranges.

It asked how much she works. When the answer was less than 5 days, it asked if she was looking for more work. She said no and was asked to choose one of the following reasons.


They thought up 10 options and not one was even close to "this is how much I want to work".

Each option was just a variation of 'There's no work for me' or 'I have no time'.

It's as if they couldn't even imagine a person who doesn't long to hand over even more of their life to work.

I reckon that surveys like this, and about a hundred other things, herd/lure/peer-pressure us into working 5 days per week even though there's no real reason to.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Adam ruins work

The TV show Adam Ruins Everything took a look at the workplace - and the 40 hour work week. It confirms my thoughts that the 40-hour work week (or at least it's relevance today) is a figment of our imagination. Very enlightening. Watch it now . The first 7 minutes are the most relevant. There were some astonishing stats coming out of it. For example, we spend only 45% of the work week doing our actual job (not including meetings etc). That's about 18 hours per week. Interestingly, that's what experts predicted. With rises in productivity, the 1950s brought talk of a 4-day work week. By 2030 they reckoned we might work just 15 hours per week. But instead we work longer hours. That results in more mistakes and safety mishaps. It also reduces brain function. We might think that it's being productive but Adam points to countries that have as much prosperity as America while working much shorter hours. A classic case of 'less is more'. PS. for the basis of ...

My mug shot

This is every mug I own. How many did I buy? Zero. They seem to just appear. I don't even drink tea or coffee. In winter I have might have a hot chocolate or cocoa. So 9 mugs seems like a lot. How does this happen? I reckon most mugs are gifts. There are two reasons for this. 1. It's a safe bet. People need to drink. It's kind of like buying your dad socks for father's day. But the difference is that socks wear out and need replacing. Cups don't. One of these mugs i received as a kid in the 90s. It still works fine. Now it has 8 friends. 2. It's often for what's on the mug. It might be a greeting card-style message, or a sports team logo, or something humorous. It's a good thing that something functional can also provide an inspiring message or pleasant memory as you use it. But the problem comes when we have too much. If I use the cup my sister gave me at Christmas, then I'm not using the 'awesome brother' one she already gave m...

Die with Zero

This book is not for everyone - but can be immensely valuable for those who are meant to read it. If you're thinking you'll reach zero a lot earlier than that, then I'd recommend starting with  Your Money or Your Life . Otherwise, here is what I learnt from Die with Zero  and my personal reaction. Many people in the middle class (and above) retire with heaps of money. Then they spend some of the investment earnings, while their capital continues to grow - even into their 80s and 90s. Their last day is possibly the wealthiest they've ever been. What's wrong with that? That might sound good. Why wouldn't we want ever-increasing wealth? The answer is in the book's subtitle "Getting all you can from your money and your life". There's no prize for being the richest person in the cemetery. Bill figures that if someone dies at 90 with 4 million dollars, that they either missed out on doing things with that money, or spent way too much time working - f...