The Work Day.

Why is it so long? When and why did 8 hours/day become the
standard for full-time employment? It's too long. Spend half your
day working, just so you can live the other half (16 hour days;
I'm not couting the 8 hours of sleep we all need). You have no
time left to better yourself.

Jeez, and that's not even including the time it takes to commute
to and from work, that's probably another 2 hours/day; assuming
you even have a car. If you don't, you have to spend even more
time commuting because the bus schedules never seem to
coincide with your work schedule.

It's crazy, man...

Ladies and gentlemen, Ethic is not a student of history. The eight hour work day is great. It's half what the work day was at the beginning of the industrial revolution, and the workers aren't little kids anymore (in the industrialized countries). For your edification and enlightenment, I will now quote part of my European History book.

Robert Owen. Robert Owen (1771-1858) did not have a family business to develop. The son of a small tradesman, he was apprenticed to a clothier at the age of 10. As a teenager he worked as a shop assistand in Manchester, where he audaciously applied for a job as a manager of a cotton mill. At 19, he was supervising 500 workers and learning the cotton trade. Owen was immediately successful, increasing the output of his workers and introducing new materials to the mill. In 1816, he entered a partnership to purchase the New Lanark mill in Scotland. Owen found conditions in Scotland much worse than those in Machester. More than 500 workhouse children were employed at New Lanark, where drunkenness and theft were endemic. Owen believed that to improve the quality of work one had to improve the quality of the workplace. He replaced old machinery with new, reduced working hours, and instituted a monitoring system to check theft. To enhance life outside the factory, he estaqblished a high-quality company-run store, which plowed its profits into a school for village children.
Owen was struck by the irony that in the mills, machines were better cared for than were humans. He thought that with the same attention to detail that had so improved the quality of commodities he could make even greater improvements in the quality of life. He prohibited children under 10 from mill work and instituted a 10-hour day for child labor. His local school took infants from one year old, freeing women to work and ensuring each child an education. Owen instituted old-age and disability pensions, funded by mandatory contributions from workers' wages. Taverns were closed and workers were fined for drunkenness and sexual offenses. In the factory and the village, Owen established a principle of cummunal regulation to improve both the work and the character of his employees. New Lanark became the model of the world of the future, and each year thousands made an industrial pilgramage to visit it.

The Wages of Progress

Robert Owen ended his life as a social reformer. His efforts to improve the lot of his workers at New Lanark led to experiments to crete ideal industrial communities throughout the world. He founded cooperative societies, in which all members shared in the profits of the business, and supported trade unions in which workers could better their lives. ... The Factory Act (1833) prohibited factory work by children under nine, provided two hours of daily education, and effectively created a 12-hour day in the mills under the Ten Hours Act (1847). The Mines Act (1842) prohibited women and children from working underground.

Civilization in the West, Fourth Edition Pg 746-747

Yeah, so I didn't answer when the eight hour day became standard - the point is, stop $$$$$ing. It could be a lot worse. Stupid communists... never want to work, just want the benefits.

Well, then open your own business and work less than 8 hours, ( businessmen work for more than 8 hours at the biginning ) or let your emploees work as long as they want ( from 2 hours untill 4 hours maximum ). Well... it's gonna be fun! Why don't you try it?

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

You soon get the hang of it.

Then-Get up, realise its your day off-realise you are too tired to do anything.

Get up, go to work.

Get up, go to work.

Such is life..........

"I owe, I owe, it's off to work I go..."

lol adrian

I am working full time during the summer, manual labour, and its boring, Its not what I plan on doing for rest of my life, but I have no idea how people can do it, day in, day out for years and years.

After I get home from work, Im usually tired, and sometimes I dont feel like doing anything, so its a waste of my time off. I just love weekends, sleeping in, NO WORK!, they should have 3 day weekends!

LOL @ adrian too

Originally posted by blackrat364
Ladies and gentlemen, Ethic is not a student of history. The eight hour work day is great. It's half what the work day was at the beginning of the industrial revolution, and the workers aren't little kids anymore (in the industrialized countries). For your edification and enlightenment, I will now quote part of my European History book.


Civilization in the West, Fourth Edition Pg 746-747

Yeah, so I didn't answer when the eight hour day became standard - the point is, stop $$$$$ing. It could be a lot worse. Stupid communists... never want to work, just want the benefits.

No, I'm not a student of history. I'm not a student at all. I'm 21,
and have actually had the experience of working 8, 10, 12+
hours per day. You're 17 and have never had a full-time job;
don't bother saying that you have, nobody will believe you. If you
have, then you'd reference experience rather than a history book
to form your opinion of the work day.

The 8 hour work day is not great, and to say that people should
be happy because of it for no other reason than "it could be a
lot worse" is just stupid. It's like saying someone should be
happy that they were only raped, and not raped and murdered.

Stupid Communist? Yeah, I'm communist. Where did I
say I was a communist? Where did I say I only wanted the
benefits of an 8 hour work day? There are no benefits of an 8
hour work day. You're not even making sense.

Stop $$$$$ing? It's only through "$$$$$ing" that change happens. It's
people like me (more specifically, me) that are going to change the
world for the better. Why? Because we (I) are the ones that notice
and bring attention to the problems. I'd like to think of myself as a
revolutionist-in-waiting...

Just wait, 100 years from now a statue of me will replace the statue
of liberty; and I will forever be remembered as the person who
single-handedly made the world a great place to live.

Either that, or I'll be a super model.

Nop!
The world won't change for the better with less than 8-hours work.

>revolutionist-in-waiting
Haha! All children under 12 believe that!

>>Stop $$$$$ing? It's only through "$$$$$ing" that change happens. It's people like me (more specifically, me) that are going to change the world for the better. Why? Because we (I) are the ones that notice and bring attention to the problems. I'd like to think of myself as a revolutionist-in-waiting...

This is why ethic's threads are the most interesting to read.

Hey there, bring "attention to the problems" guy, keep in mind that most people don't view your quandary as an actual problem.

Sadly, the reality is ethic is going to wind up with an 8 hour a day or more job. *plays the violin*

>>Just wait, 100 years from now a statue of me will replace the statue of liberty; and I will forever be remembered as the person who single-handedly made the world a great place to live.



I repeat:

This is why ethic's threads are the most interesting to read.

>>Either that, or I'll be a super model.

Why not become a super model now?

>Why not become a super model now?

Because, it's too commercial. It used to be about the art of super
modeling, now it's just about the money. It's all those damn sell-
out super models that ruined the industry.

My work day starts at 8:45 and finishes at 5:00 and I don't think its too bad. At the moment I'm on a scholarship scheme with a paint company and I'm a paint chemist. My day can be boring if I do practical stuff all day (working in colour section I have to be able to make any colour of paint), but thankfully if I fancy a change, or just need to do some, I can go and sit down and do some brain work. Can be quite complicated trying to get a paint a certain colour even using computers.
I like my job though because its always different and its at a calm pace, very rarely do I go home feeling tired.

Ethic, last summer I worked full time. I worked over time many weeks - 48 hours sometimes. In five days. I plan to do the same this summer. Nope, you don't have to believe me, but I'm right. (Just trying to keep the thread interesting)

Originally posted by blackrat364
(Just trying to keep the thread interesting)

You're not very good at that. Just let ethic take care of it.

It's his job, which he does 8 hours a day with no pay, by the way.

Believe it or not, I like to work. It gives me something to do.