Author Topic: How many hours per week do you work?  (Read 14627 times)

Lanthiriel

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How many hours per week do you work?
« on: October 03, 2017, 10:06:38 PM »
Inspired by a recent post I stumbled across on Reddit, I wonder how many hours per week the average Mustachian works. There were a bunch of comments from people who regularly work 60+ hours per week and the general concensus was that's what it takes to be successful. I strongly disagree with this idea and have always focused on quality of work over quantity, which has not yet led me astray (no employer has ever commented that I don't work long enough hours).

I'm interested to hear from you guys: how many hours do you work? Does working more hours directly or indirectly affect your compensation (e.g. Hourly employees vs bonuses, raises, etc)?  Do you think the "work more" mindset is a generational thing, or do you have examples of when long hours have contributed directly to a promotion or raise?

I make $80k and rarely work more than 45 hours per week. I feel like I'm compensated fairly and it would take a pretty big bump to get me work more hours. I've never felt like my lack of desire to put more hours on my time card has been a detriment and indeed have seen that people respect me more when I do stay late to support a project because they know it's a result of my commitment to the work and not because I am using my time inefficiently.
« Last Edit: October 03, 2017, 10:28:41 PM by Lanthiriel »

Lance Hiruma

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #1 on: October 03, 2017, 10:20:27 PM »
I used to work 70+ hours a week, but now I am shooting for 40-45. At my level, merit increase is predictably standard, bonus and shares depends on macro and micro environments as well as internal and external factors. And I respect the circadian. Having a FIRE date definitely helps tremendously. :)

pdxvandal

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #2 on: October 03, 2017, 10:24:15 PM »
Worked 50-60 hours a week in my 20s, 40-50 hours a week in my 30s and 35-45 hours per week in my 40s so far (two years in).

Lanthiriel

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #3 on: October 03, 2017, 10:31:48 PM »
Are you guys glad you put in those hours? Do you think it directly contributed to achieving your current positions? Or do you think you could have worked fewer hours in the early years and have achieved the same level of success?

nnls

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #4 on: October 03, 2017, 10:43:44 PM »
I do a 96 hour fortnight, but I do shift work so its  8, 12 hour days and then I get 6 full days off.

I get extra allowances on top of my base salary because of the shift work. My before tax salary would drop by about 50k if I did a normal Monday to Friday 40 hour week

alsoknownasDean

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #5 on: October 04, 2017, 02:15:37 AM »
38 hours a week is my official work hours. My actual hours can be a bit above or a bit below that, depending on workload at the time.

JLee

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #6 on: October 04, 2017, 02:38:08 AM »
Lately around 34 due to some advantageous scheduling encouraged by my boss's boss.  When that reverts to normal, 40.

Freedomin5

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #7 on: October 04, 2017, 04:20:50 AM »
Officially, 30 hours per week. Unofficially, around 40. It directly affects my pay and my opportunities for advancement. For example, a colleague who started at the same time as I did, with fewer qualifications, was recently promoted so that she now heads her own group. She works (and has worked since I've known her) 7 days per week, 10-12 hours per day.

Good thing I'm semi-Mustachian and have kept our savings rate at around 80%, which has allowed us to barrel towards FI. If I chose to work more hours, we know from experience that our family would suffer, our stress levels would increase significantly, and it would generally be a miserable time.

Cranky

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #8 on: October 04, 2017, 05:09:53 AM »
(Full disclosure - I'm not really Mustachian in that I enjoy my job and don't want to retire early.)

I work 20 hours/week by my contract, because if I work more than that I would have to buy my school's crummy health insurance. In practice, I work somewhat more than that, depending on what I want to get done.

My dh is in science, and has always worked science hours. Early career, he easily put in 60 hours/week. At this point, I'd say he works closer to 50 hours/week, as he comes home early but does a lot of work online these days. He's a few years out from retirement.

If you don't want to work those hours in science, you aren't going to get far, that was his experience.

Mmm_Donuts

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #9 on: October 04, 2017, 05:17:59 AM »
I used to work 60-80 hours, but lately in semi-FIRE it's been on average 16-24 hours. Occasionally this drifts into 40 hour week, which I almost immediately find to be too much. I'm happiest working in the 2-3 day / week range.

YoungInvestor

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #10 on: October 04, 2017, 05:59:10 AM »
Usually between 36-40 hours, I've in a while it might get to 45. I'm lucky enough to work for a company that pays me well and is considerate for my personal time.

I'm here for the FI more so than for the RE.

Raenia

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #11 on: October 04, 2017, 06:01:14 AM »
Officially, I'm hourly and work 40hr/wk.  In reality, some weeks come out to 45-50hrs, but we keep careful track of the excess and try to leave early in the following weeks to make up the difference.  I currently have >12hrs of comp time racked up, but I'm also planning on leaving early every day this week, so in the end it works out.

dcheesi

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #12 on: October 04, 2017, 06:21:58 AM »
Most of the time it's 40 hours, give or take. I might shave off a half hour here or there when things are slow, or stay a bit later if there's a problem or deadline. I've only worked significantly more than 40 hours in isolated cases, no more than a few weeks in a row and a few months altogether.

When I have worked extra time, I've generally found that coming in on weekends is more productive than working longer hours in a day. With the kind of work I do (SW dev), quality and quantity of output both suffer when I'm mentally fatigued.

But there's no way I'm doing that every weekend, so sooner or later things revert to the norm. Thankfully our corporate culture has always been onboard with that.

caracarn

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #13 on: October 04, 2017, 06:24:08 AM »
So I do what is needed when we have a crisis.  Working in tech, if you have a data center down and you had dinner plans with your family, you call your wife and let her know you'll get back to her letting her know when you're heading out.  Given that however, other than my first year out of college when I took my first job at a Fortune 500 firm and worked 70-80+ hours per week (typical day was 7 AM- 11 PM) I would say I averaged in the low 40 hours.  I currently make more than twice who OP does and still have that.  As said, there are times on project my teams get involved in when I need to do more, but most cases I'm here 7-5 but if I need to leave early or come in later because of a doctor or something I need to do for the kids, I just do what I need to.  I have always been very focused on doing what I say and I've found that builds a trust level that gets you a lot of slack over the average joe, who wants the same treatment but is always missing deadlines or making excuses.  I guess it's the actual application of "work smarter, not harder". 

I've been blessed to be able to get most tasks done much faster than most, so almost every job I've had through the years has a lot of slack time.  I think all organizations really have no idea how much time a task should take and so people are given more than enough time.  I think a lot of people develop terrible habits and work inefficiently and therefore may need to plow extra hours in.  Much more frequently however, I see people just parking their butt in a seat to be seen and get known as the first to arrive and the last to leave.  I have worked for a few "clock watchers" over the years and so you end up present when they want you there, because that's the gig, but a lot of that time is spent passing time because there is not enough work to fill that time. 

In my experience the hours you need to work have a lot to do with the company culture and how they operate.  Most long hour places have a crap ton of meetings, which are giant time wasters.  If you have six hours of meetings a day, you're not going to only work 40 hours.  I attended meetings I had to, but have always been vocal about letting people know if they can't give me a reason for why I either provide value in the meeting or will get value from it, then I don't need to be there.  As I moved into leadership roles (which happened pretty fast, in my late 20s) I controlled much more of if a meeting was even called and so I was able to influence this a lot more.  I'm in the middle of a major ERP implementation. I've had one meeting with senior management so far six months into the project.  The rest is handled with written communication.  I get people together when talking will speed up the result.  That one meeting lasted 15 minutes and we made three decisions.  We'll meet again in a month.  I also am willing to have the hard conversation with bosses about time in the seat, and have been my whole career.  I'll be here whenever I need to be, but with that comes the expectation that I will not be when I do not need to be just to make it seem like I'm here.  If I need to attend an important doctor's visit for one of my kids in the middle of the day, I'm not going to be made to feel guilty about leaving the office.  Maybe I've just had a decades long streak of luck in finding good bosses, or maybe your managers are less hung up about you putting in a set number of extra hours than you think.  I've found being respectful of the organization and doing what is needed buys you the freedom to do what you need.

caracarn

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #14 on: October 04, 2017, 06:36:56 AM »
Are you guys glad you put in those hours? Do you think it directly contributed to achieving your current positions? Or do you think you could have worked fewer hours in the early years and have achieved the same level of success?
I was not glad when I was working 70+ hours a week.  In fact, I left that job in a year because I determined what good is it to be paid well, if I never have any time to use the money they are paying me (this was when I was more spendypants, certainly.  Now I realize I should look at it like those submariners that have no way to spend money and then hit port with a ton of cash, so it did help me save more than I might have).  I was blessed to have another company that had wanted me to come work for them instead continue to pursue me for the year I was there and so just accepted their umpteenth request to join them (and I got to name my salary, so that was an added bonus). 

Your second question is a bit tricky.  Obviously the work I did before contributed to my current positions.  However since after that first year I fought to work reasonable hours from them forward, if you are asking would working tons of extra hours directly contributed to my current position, the answer is obviously no, because I did not do much of that and none of the jobs I moved to ever asked how much I worked at the previous ones so they'd have had no idea anyway. 

For the third question, no I do not think I could have worked many fewer hours because I was between 40-45 most of the time, so cutting back to less than the expected base rate would most likely have been a problem.  But I think the spirit of your question is more to those who work 50-60+ hours and I'm living proof that is not needed to end up (per the income/net worth percentile thread on these forums) at 90%+ of income for my age range.

ender

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #15 on: October 04, 2017, 06:38:39 AM »
Between 35-45 a week.

Schaefer Light

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #16 on: October 04, 2017, 06:43:42 AM »
How many hours do I work or how many hours am I at work?

aneel

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #17 on: October 04, 2017, 06:51:59 AM »
How many hours do I work or how many hours am I at work?

Agree this is important to distinguish.

At my first job I was required to be in the office 40 hours per week, but only had ~ 30-35 hrs worth of work.  I hated being under worked in an open cube where it was taboo to surf the web or otherwise occupy your time and it affected my self worth.
At my last job I WORKED 50+ / wk and was a cog in the machine - anyone could have done my work, we just needed manhours.  IT SUCKED.
At my current job I am at work ~38 hrs per week, and actually working ~35 hrs.  My current job has the best work life balance I've seen.  No one is here to make sure you're putting in your arbitrary 40 hours as long as you're getting your tasks done.

Gondolin

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #18 on: October 04, 2017, 07:14:12 AM »
The "work more" mindset is not generational, it is cultural. (North) American culture appears to have a very simple calculus.

Work = Good
More work = Better
This,
Those who work most, are the most virtuous.

People on Reddit claiming they all work 60+ is the equivalent of that douche in the locker room trying to impress you by telling you how he "railed this chick for 3 hours straight!". Because sex is good so more sex must be better! You know it's a crock but, don't feel like getting into an argument.


plog

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #19 on: October 04, 2017, 07:15:18 AM »
I work maybe 10 hours a week.  I am present at my work place for 40 hours a week. 

boarder42

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #20 on: October 04, 2017, 07:21:34 AM »
I work maybe 10 hours a week.  I am present at my work place for 40 hours a week.

this is about right.  and i'm pretty successful at what i do.  those working 60+ hours and claiming you need that to be successful are either very inefficient or very not smart.

trollwithamustache

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #21 on: October 04, 2017, 08:17:33 AM »
remember, if you are on reddit, (or for that matter these forums!) you aren't working.

I bill about 50 hours most weeks. I will probably bill about 2500 hrs total this year. (peak was low 80s per week in the summer). The plan next year is to get that back down to normal ~1850.


omachi

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #22 on: October 04, 2017, 08:49:12 AM »
32 hours a week now and highly recommend it to anybody that can swing it. Started this year and it's had a huge impact on my happiness levels. Technically still a full time employee with full benefits as long as it's 32+, but paid for hours worked (and paid for hours if I go over 40, too).

catccc

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #23 on: October 04, 2017, 08:58:01 AM »
My organization standard is 37.5 hours per week for full time employees.

I rarely work more and often work less.  I am present in the office for 22.5 of these 37.5 hours, and I telecommute 2 days a week. 

For a while I used rescuetime software to track what I was actually doing on my laptop.  You can categorize the website/software as business, communications, social media, etc.  Based on rescue time reports, I think I do 10-15 hours of actual work most weeks.  It can really vary depending on what is happening at work, though.  I bet some weeks are under 10 and some weeks exceed 20.  But I goof off much of the time I should be working.  IMO, I'm salaried and getting what they want completed done, so this is a-ok.

sparkytheop

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #24 on: October 04, 2017, 09:11:16 AM »
I work 80 hours a pay period (two weeks), so I might do six 12 hour nights one week, but then only have to do one 8 hour shift the next week.  Anything over that 80 hours is overtime.  I have to be on-site and available at every moment, so no official lunch break where I'm "off the clock".  However, there is a lot of down time, so I'm not physically (or even mentally) working all those hours, but I can't go home.

I'm actually really happy with my schedule and my work/life balance.  If I had to truly work every one of those hours (like I used to in my last job), I'd be aiming to get out earlier.  But, as a coworker puts it, we get paid to come through in the emergencies.  As long as I do my rounds, other required duties, and can handle the emergencies, I'm good.

Step37

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #25 on: October 04, 2017, 09:21:18 AM »
Currently four days/32 hours per week. My goal, over the next two months, is to reduce the office days to two, and do a little bit from home on the other days, for a total of 20 hours. A couple of months ago, I hired a very capable person (in anticipation of this) to replace me in the day-to-day operations, and she’s working out even better than I’d dared to hope for. I’ve never worked so few hours as I’m planning, but I’m pretty sure I will like it! It is good to let go of the strong “control” tendencies... if I want this to work, I have no choice.

It’s funny, but prior to this position (where I am a shareholder in the company so by definition should “want” to work more), I worked ridiculous hours at a company in which I held no stake (staying late, weekends, whatever it took). In the end, it all worked out okay, as I got a large bonus when that company sold, and it was a good time to exit, as I no longer felt any loyalty to the ownership group. I was just never willing to let work dominate my life in that way again. A good learning experience, to be sure, but an extremely stressful four years.

kamille

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #26 on: October 04, 2017, 02:50:08 PM »
I work a minimum of 24 hours and maximum of 84 hours/week. I get paid hourly in 12 hour shifts and get time and a half for after 40 hours/week. Sometimes it's really easy and sometimes it's really stressful. I like choosing how much time I want to put into work on any given week. For me, more work equals more pay among other benefits. I'm not looking for a promotion (mostly salaried and less flexible positions anyways) and near the top of my pay scale already.

Retire-Canada

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #27 on: October 04, 2017, 03:01:13 PM »
24hrs a week over 3 days. I think 18hrs a week over 3 days would be perfect assuming you have to work at all.

2Birds1Stone

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #28 on: October 04, 2017, 04:03:51 PM »
About 40 hours, give or take 10.

My new job will be much more if I count travel time.

Lanthiriel

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #29 on: October 04, 2017, 05:32:28 PM »
Thanks, guys. I felt momentarily crazy about my desire to stick as close to a 40-hour work week as possible in a white collar job. I too have the "stay until the work that needs to be done is done" motto, but as I get older, I've learned that things I used to think were emergencies could actually wait. I've done too many 12-hour days followed by being bored out of my mind the following day when I have to be in my seat from 8AM to 5PM.

remember, if you are on reddit, (or for that matter these forums!) you aren't working.
Note the after hours posting times.

Retire-Canada

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #30 on: October 04, 2017, 05:40:04 PM »
..those working 60+ hours and claiming you need that to be successful are either very inefficient or very not smart.

or they are in a different industry with different rules....

or they measure success differently...

or.....

JLee

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #31 on: October 04, 2017, 06:15:58 PM »
Thanks, guys. I felt momentarily crazy about my desire to stick as close to a 40-hour work week as possible in a white collar job. I too have the "stay until the work that needs to be done is done" motto, but as I get older, I've learned that things I used to think were emergencies could actually wait. I've done too many 12-hour days followed by being bored out of my mind the following day when I have to be in my seat from 8AM to 5PM.

remember, if you are on reddit, (or for that matter these forums!) you aren't working.
Note the after hours posting times.

I used to work for a company where the field support guys would routinely pull 50+ hour weeks (salaried) and I was told by a friend in that position that's just what you have to do in order to get ahead in the industry.  I wasn't going to play that game; I tracked hours and took comp days when I built up enough time past my normal 40hr work week.  I then left that company and went to my current place (earning significantly more than my friend, while working fewer hours).

He's since changed jobs and now realizes how poor of a situation everyone was in at the last place.

There are some jobs where extra time put in actually means something, but there are also some where the company will just burn out their staff for profit.

sparkytheop

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #32 on: October 04, 2017, 06:29:44 PM »
I work a minimum of 24 hours and maximum of 84 hours/week. I get paid hourly in 12 hour shifts and get time and a half for after 40 hours/week. Sometimes it's really easy and sometimes it's really stressful. I like choosing how much time I want to put into work on any given week. For me, more work equals more pay among other benefits. I'm not looking for a promotion (mostly salaried and less flexible positions anyways) and near the top of my pay scale already.

If the job under your avatar is still your job (or, well, even if it was), I just want to say "thank you" for what you do.  My son spent his first two weeks in the NICU, and the nurses he had were amazing, both with the babies, and helping the parents stay sane.  I'm sure there are some really hard days...

lexde

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #33 on: October 05, 2017, 06:07:50 AM »
Officially, 167/month. Realistically 225. Not fun.


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Dragonswan

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #34 on: October 05, 2017, 06:46:32 AM »
80 hours a pay period.  Whether I worked in private industry or the public sector, I rarely do overtime. I make over 100K and am where I want to be in my career.

My philosophy has always been that I work smart enough, efficiently and productively enough that if the routine work takes more than 40 hours a week, you need to hire an additional person.  I have this philosophy from a movie I saw in class when I was in grade school (the point the teacher was trying to make was to get your education).  It was an immigrant family where the father worked long hours in a meat cutting factory and one day died on the job when the son was about 13.  The son said he was going to quit school and go work in the factory to support the family.  The grandfather told him to stay in school because, "When the horse dies you get another horse."  I vowed I was not going to ever let myself be overworked because an employer views you as a horse that can be replaced if something happens to you.  As I have matured and worked many years I have seen this to be true. The more important you are, the quicker they replace you.  Even when a president dies, we mourn him for a day and move on.  He's so important we elect his replacement in with him. 

Stepping off my soapbox now.

Erma

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #35 on: October 05, 2017, 07:06:48 AM »
Four days 34 hours. Not allowed to do overtime.

caracarn

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #36 on: October 05, 2017, 08:07:27 AM »
..those working 60+ hours and claiming you need that to be successful are either very inefficient or very not smart.

or they are in a different industry with different rules....

or they measure success differently...

or.....
I do think these are fallacies people tell themselves to justify to their families (and themselves) why they toil away at the job.  The old saying "no one ever said I wish I spent more time at the office on their deathbed" is a saying for a reason.  Measuring success by how much time you spend working is a weird metric.  I've never seen one study saying more time working meant more done.  In fact, most workplace studies show the opposite, that we become very inefficient very quickly after a certain sweet spot of about 4-6 hours.  The different industry with different rules is just the same thing everyone said about external forces making you feel like you need to do that to succeed, but let's not fool ourselves.  If you are not slacking off and not working and your workload really takes 60-80 hours but your employer is paying you for 40 as a salaried worker, you have voluntarily chosen to support their desire to not hire another lawyer/doctor/whatever industry "requires" long hours to succeed when the workload clearly dictates it.  That's where I'd align somewhat with boarder's point of not being very smart.  I've know several doctors or lawyers that are top performers in their firm but work around 40 hours, and this is notoriously two industries that make you believe differently, that that will not work.  But somehow they are doing it and doing well. 

Retire-Canada

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #37 on: October 05, 2017, 08:24:19 AM »
I do think these are fallacies people tell themselves to justify to their families (and themselves) why they toil away at the job.

I am working 24hrs a week. I can call someone stupid who works 40hrs a week because I can get everything done in 24hrs. However, I don't see that as a useful commentary on someone else's life given the level of generalization that's going on. I also don't think you can define success for other people.

If you want to say 40hrs a week is a reasonable amount to work. I'd agree. If you start insulting people based on a #/hrs worked per week with no other knowledge of their lives I think that's stupid.

trollwithamustache

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #38 on: October 05, 2017, 09:02:21 AM »
I do think these are fallacies people tell themselves to justify to their families (and themselves) why they toil away at the job.

I am working 24hrs a week. I can call someone stupid who works 40hrs a week because I can get everything done in 24hrs. However, I don't see that as a useful commentary on someone else's life given the level of generalization that's going on. I also don't think you can define success for other people.

If you want to say 40hrs a week is a reasonable amount to work. I'd agree. If you start insulting people based on a #/hrs worked per week with no other knowledge of their lives I think that's stupid.

what about facetime? Some organizations really value this and so you are stuck sitting there, being available and perky about it for the company's next whim, even if that is a week away!

I'm a red panda

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #39 on: October 05, 2017, 09:06:39 AM »
I work a minimum of 40 hours a week. Butt in the chair is required. (Although they are really flexible about when.)

Most weeks I actually work about 45 hours, sometimes 50.  More than 50 is rare.  I'm good about putting my foot down on too much overtime.

We travel about 5 times a year, so then I work weekends and evenings. 

ketchup

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #40 on: October 05, 2017, 09:20:13 AM »
I work 40, more like 45 a few times a year.

My girlfriend is self-employed and works anywhere from 0 to 100 hours a week, but averages out to substantially less than me.  She also travels a lot for work, and has more recently made an effort to make that as efficient as possible time-wise.

JanetJackson

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #41 on: October 05, 2017, 09:41:54 AM »
I work 30 hours for a company, and between 20-30 hours for myself, sometimes I'll have to tack on 5-10 hours to that.... or knock a few hours off.
I'd say I average about 55 hours per week, maybe 60?

I am hourly for the company I work for, so extra hours (they will allow me up to 35 if needed, but prefer 25-30) absolutely make a difference.  However, if I COULD be working less yet making the same amount, I certainly would. 
My side work is pet walking/sitting/ etc, an Etsy shop, and occasionally cleaning homes.  I cannot "speed up" the pet care in order to make more (although I can bundle clients), but I CAN speed up how I make my Etsy products, or how fast I clean a home.  Aside from the pet-sitting (I really love animals), I would work LESS if possible at all of these things if it were possible. 
I've pretty much found the point of diminishing return in regards to speed when working Etsy or cleaning, though... so there's not much wiggle room there.

So in summary, I am a wildly efficient worker but I have hourly rate positions and therefor can't change how much I work very much.  I'd like this to change sometime in the future, but my income is currently dependent on me working about 55-60 hours per week. 
If I worked 40, I'd have zero chance at FI (not as worried about the RE part, I just want FI) before old age.

Saskatchewstachian

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #42 on: October 05, 2017, 09:49:15 AM »
Work 50 hrs a week and get paid for a bit less (salary). The hard part is that it requires me to be away from home Mon-Fri so a 50hr work week is actually 110hrs that I have to spend away from family.

Not the ideal situation as there is no pay benefit for being gone all week either (recently removed). The only upside is the site jobs are much more secure than the city jobs.

Schaefer Light

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SpareChange

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #44 on: October 06, 2017, 07:57:39 AM »
40. Actually "at" work 42.5 if you count the lunch. Every other weekend on call. I get called in on probably 50% or so of those. I try to grab overtime whenever it pops up.

TravelJunkyQC

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #45 on: October 06, 2017, 09:39:42 AM »
"Officially" 37.5 hours. At the office around 40-43 ish hours. + when I respond to clients on my phone from home (my partner hates this). + the occasional 1 hour every two weeks for freelance work.

I don't mind because I enjoy my work. My partner also works 45ish hours on his PhD, so we work equally as much and ensure we spend time together as well. And also, we're planning on having children in a few years, and we are both onboard with scaling down when that time comes. We're putting in more hours now to be able to squirrel money away and relax when the kidlets arrive (and hopefully semi-retire in 10 to 15 years).

Blissful Biker

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #46 on: October 06, 2017, 10:07:08 AM »
I generally worked 50-55 hour weeks through my 20's and 30's.  My office is currently slow so I have taken the opportunity to switch to part time, about 20 hours a week and am loving it.  My productivity per hour is really high and I have time to really enjoy the other aspects of my life. 

My rate of savings is of course lower at 20 hours a week but at this point the markets impact on my stache has a bigger effect on FIRE than my savings does.  And I like my 20 hour job quite a bit, so I no longer feel so hungry for FIRE.  Balancing enjoying today with enjoying tomorrow.

Finallyunderstand

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #47 on: October 06, 2017, 10:21:24 AM »
Typically about 25 hours per week.  I like to think I'm very efficient with my time.  Sub contractor (Realtor).  Early in my career I would chase every lead.  Now I can usually recognize legitimate buyers/sellers and stick to a different (higher) price point of clients, etc.  It has greatly increased my income while lowering my hours worked.  Win win.

freemonk

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #48 on: October 06, 2017, 06:53:14 PM »
30 hours or 37.5 hours depending on how many days worked... intensity level is 100.

MoonLiteNite

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Re: How many hours per week do you work?
« Reply #49 on: October 07, 2017, 02:32:22 AM »
40-80.
Last 3 years i averaged 72. But this year only sitting at 55, which has been a nice break! Sadly that is about to change in nov :( back up to the easy  60-70 hours every week for 9 months.

edit:
Last year when i decided to go for the FI by age 40, i did the math and i figured working an avg of 60hours per a week i could easily hit my goal. Working 72 average would put me well over, but not worth the stress. And working my current hours, well that puts me near the shortfall and i may not quite hit my goals without doing some side work.
« Last Edit: October 07, 2017, 02:34:32 AM by MoonLiteNite »