Anti 8 Hour Workday

While legislation to set a standard “8 hour workday” was good to prevent workers from being exploited to have to work 14+ hour workdays, if also seems to have been a huge detriment, making it the standard to work at least 8 hours a day (not less).

One size should not fit all.

“It is impossible to establish universal uniformity of hours without inflicting very serious injury to workers.”—Motion at the recent Trades’ Congress. Cartoon from the Project Gutenberg eBook of Punch, Volume 101, 19 September 1891, by John Tenniel

The 8 hour workday as a Procrustean bed.

Now the problem:

Because the 8 hour workday was instituted, it becomes the new expectation that we should work AT LEAST 8 hours everyday.

And based from my friends and my personal experience, nobody in a salary job works 8 or fewer hours a day. They generally work 9-12 hours a day.

The 4 hour workweek

As much criticism as Tim Ferriss gets, I think his basic notion of the 4 hour workweek is on the money:

Don’t live according to normal societal standards.