The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Ask a Mustachian => Topic started by: omachi on February 28, 2017, 01:51:14 PM
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I've recently learned that I have the option to work reduced hours with the only effects being prorated pay and vacation time. I'll keep my health insurance, paid parking, 401(k), etc. No paperwork to fill out, either. Everything just gets prorated based on hours worked, provided I'm at 32+ per week.
I've been wanting more time for myself, I'm in a good financial position, and I would really like reduced stress from 4 day weeks. All indications are that everybody in management is fine with employees taking advantage of this option, so I'm not too worried about repercussions. At least, I expect I'd get a talking to before there were any real consequences.
I'd drop about $16,000 in terms of what I take home after taxes. That would kick my FIRE date back about a year, but I'm leaning towards it anyway. Recent stress has had me considering changes, and I don't know that I'll find something that pays as well as the reduced rate with less stress. It is hard to give up that much income, though.
So my question is: what would you pay to have Fridays off?
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I would do it in a heart beat, especially if it only delays FIRE by a year. I am on the 9/80 schedule (every other Friday off) and it would have to take a big raise for me to go back to working every Friday.
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i'm about to do it or at least request to do it. we should be having a child in the next year and i'll request to take monday's off at that point. figure i need a life event to make it more acceptable as i think its likely frowned upon at my place of business. its worth 20% pay cut to me.
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It really would depend how far out you currently are from FIRE, for example: are you currently one year from fire and taking this cut will double your time to fire? Or are you 10 years out thus only pushing your fire date back 10%.
If we begin discussing burn-out (which it appears you are) and the other option would be finding another job that pays 16k less 5 days a week, this begins to make much more sense. At the end of the day though, if I was feeling burnt out yes I would take the cut. However I would try to hold on as long as I could.
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It really would depend how far out you currently are from FIRE, for example: are you currently one year from fire and taking this cut will double your time to fire? Or are you 10 years out thus only pushing your fire date back 10%.
If we begin discussing burn-out (which it appears you are) and the other option would be finding another job that pays 16k less 5 days a week, this begins to make much more sense. At the end of the day though, if I was feeling burnt out yes I would take the cut. However I would try to hold on as long as I could.
i highly doubt that someone one year from FIRE would lose an entire year due to a 20% pay cut. that does not compute
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It really would depend how far out you currently are from FIRE, for example: are you currently one year from fire and taking this cut will double your time to fire? Or are you 10 years out thus only pushing your fire date back 10%.
If we begin discussing burn-out (which it appears you are) and the other option would be finding another job that pays 16k less 5 days a week, this begins to make much more sense. At the end of the day though, if I was feeling burnt out yes I would take the cut. However I would try to hold on as long as I could.
i highly doubt that someone one year from FIRE would lose an entire year due to a 20% pay cut. that does not compute
I agree, I was just using it for illustrative purposes.
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Thanks for the discussion. It helps to get other perspectives.
I would do it in a heart beat, especially if it only delays FIRE by a year. I am on the 9/80 schedule (every other Friday off) and it would have to take a big raise for me to go back to working every Friday.
I've done 9/80 before but 9 hour days chained to a desk weren't for me. Fridays off every other week were nice, but it was a trade of some misery for some happiness.
It really would depend how far out you currently are from FIRE, for example: are you currently one year from fire and taking this cut will double your time to fire? Or are you 10 years out thus only pushing your fire date back 10%.
If we begin discussing burn-out (which it appears you are) and the other option would be finding another job that pays 16k less 5 days a week, this begins to make much more sense. At the end of the day though, if I was feeling burnt out yes I would take the cut. However I would try to hold on as long as I could.
I've been feeling on the verge of burn out, or maybe burned out already, for about a year. I've been making some changes that have been helping, but where I'm really feeling it is not having much time to myself.
My calculations have my FIRE date conservatively 6 years out. Pushing back to 7 years would actually have me work fewer days, just over a longer period. Money compounding picks up a bit of the slack.
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Just make sure you are not expected to produce the same level of output as a full-time employee.
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I do it. Costing me about 20k in lost salary. Well worth it
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I'd do it.
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I'd take a 20% pay cut for Fridays off in a heartbeat too.
It's an interesting thought experiment to think about exactly how much time I'd take off if I could take as much as I wanted with a proportional pay cut. At this point in time I'd probably do three days a week. Maybe reduce it to 2 as my stash grows bigger ;)
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I'd happily pay 20% for Fridays off.
In fact, I do. :)
32h work weeks are awesome.
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I'll be doing something similar but likely when I'm 2-3 years pre-FI and will likely work a 24 hour schedule until well after being FI as I generally like the work and making ~$100k for part time work is hard to walk away from.
There was a recent similar thread talking about part time work that slightly extends working years versus just getting done as soon as possible.
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My wife and I have taken 3 day weekends for the past year or so.
The weekends feel so long, that even after a year, I still am not quite used to it. In a good way.
You will not regret having 4 days on, 3 days off. If you really wanted to, you could probably go back to full-time employment, right? So why not give it a try.
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Q: What would you pay for Fridays off?
A: My gross salary for that time absent.
I get Compensating Time Off as a substitute for overtime. I'm salaried otherwise.
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You will not regret having 4 days on, 3 days off. If you really wanted to, you could probably go back to full-time employment, right? So why not give it a try.
Thanks all, this is exactly what I needed to hear. I'm going to go for it. The way it's setup, I could go back to full time anytime, so long as there's space on a project.
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Thanks all, this is exactly what I needed to hear. I'm going to go for it. The way it's setup, I could go back to full time anytime, so long as there's space on a project.
Well there you go. Try it, and see how you like it. Report back.
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Since a good chunk of my retirement is tied to company ESOP. I'd work the minimum 2.5 days per week keep it if they would.let me. Probably wouldn't add more than 2 years to my FIRE plans.
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I very happily only work 4 days a week. I'm 20 pct retired. It's amazing but too short!
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I did the same thing about 16 months ago. No way would I go back. The difference in my life is profound.
Enjoy!
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i feel like its not as acceptable for younger people esp. without kids. if i was 50 i think they'd be ok with it but i'm 30. and have no kids so why are you not trying to advance and make the our employee owners more money etc. thats why i plan to use the life even of the birth of our first kid hopefully in the next year as leverage to cut my hours. we'll see how that works out.
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I probably wouldn't unless I was older, but by then I'd be nearly FI so it wouldn't matter anyway. I wish my company would let me switch to four 10s though. Has anyone ever had luck doing that in a company that typically has 8-5 hours?
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I do it already and love it. I also found that I save money in other ways as I feel more in balance and less likely to splurge on fast food and other things!
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Take it!! I work 9 hours M-Th and only work a half day EVERY Friday. It would take a LOT for me to give that up. It gives me some time to myself and keeps me sane!
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I do exactly the opposite- I work an extra day most weeks to get that extra $15k.
It'll be years before it pays off well enough that I can work 32-hour weeks rather than 48 and I'm quite looking forward to it.
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I probably wouldn't unless I was older, but by then I'd be nearly FI so it wouldn't matter anyway. I wish my company would let me switch to four 10s though. Has anyone ever had luck doing that in a company that typically has 8-5 hours?
Don't do it if everyone else works Friday and you're in a role that can work from home or would be expected to answer questions. You'll just end up work 4 10s plus Friday. If you have a job where you can't work unless you're in the office then it might work if they're willing to allow it.
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I would be weary of this if I was a salaried employee.
If you're not actually paid by the hour, my guess is that your workload wouldn't go down as much as your pay would (i.e. 90% of the work for 80% of the pay!)
I think I'd prefer to work "full time" and retire 20% sooner. And actually, I think it would be sooner than that because (1) your savings rate on that extra 20% salary would likely be higher than your savings rate on the first 80% of your salary and (2) the extra money you save compounds.
Like all things to do with early retirement, it all depends on your valuation of free time in the present vs. free time in the future.
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This is a no-brainer.
Enjoy your Fridays.
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My husband did this at his last job. It was great. It was a $35k drop in salary - he actually went down to 0.75% time. We have two young kids, so the marginal value of time to us is really high. We kept the kids in full time daycare, and he did almost all of the house chores in his time off, freeing up our evenings and weekends for more relaxed family time. Sadly, his new job does not offer this kind of arrangement, and while it's been worthwhile for him (he finds the new job much more fun than the old one), I really miss his old setup now that I have to do those chores!
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I would be weary of this if I was a salaried employee.
If you're not actually paid by the hour, my guess is that your workload wouldn't go down as much as your pay would (i.e. 90% of the work for 80% of the pay!)
I think I'd prefer to work "full time" and retire 20% sooner. And actually, I think it would be sooner than that because (1) your savings rate on that extra 20% salary would likely be higher than your savings rate on the first 80% of your salary and (2) the extra money you save compounds.
Like all things to do with early retirement, it all depends on your valuation of free time in the present vs. free time in the future.
I'm going to do it, so just explaining some of my thinking here. I'm not too concerned on workload. I'm salaried but have strict hour limits on projects, so that prevents excess work issues.
While it gives up 20% gross salary, it's quite a bit less after taxes. It's all at my marginal tax rate, so I don't net as much on it as the first 80%. I've already maxed my tax advantaged accounts, so no help there. My net take home per hour actually goes up as I'll make about 85% of current net for 80% of the work.
Ultimately, my fairly conservative math says I'll go from 6 years to FI to 7 years. That is 7 years at 80%, though, which actually means fewer work days over the long run. More lifetime free time, more of it now instead of later, and less stress overall outweighs an extra calendar year until total freedom for me.
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So my question is: what would you pay to have Fridays off?
I have Fridays off. I work 4 x 10hrs so didn't need to take a pay cut, but I did have to manoeuvre a client into changing his whole production schedule for that to happen. It took over a year of work to get there, but it's awesome. I highly recommend it.
I also had Thursdays off for a few months and had to take a 25% income cut to do that. I loved it. It was well worth it. That meant I was off for 4 days and worked for 3 days each week. I enjoyed work so much more and had two weekends. My weekend [Thurs & Fri] and my normal weekend with my GF [Sat & Sun] when she was off.
I plan to get back to a 3 days work week later this year the 25% pay cut was a reasonable trade off given I have enough invested it will get me to FIRE on its own in a reasonable time.
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I do have Thursdays off with around 16000CHF less per year than of I would work full time. It's absolutely worth it. I'm much more relaxed now and enjoy it immensely. We now work 160% between two people and it is really nice if you can do most chores during the week and have your weekend for fun things. I love it and Inhope I will never have to work a 100% job.
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I do this. I've actually never had a real full time job. My current salary is based on 80% of the work week and I still get full benefits and vacation and summer fridays (which are thursdays for me - 3 day workweek ftw!). Totally worth it. Yes, I would like to make more money and be able to save more, and I guess I'm giving up 10,000 pretax, but I'm able to live and save on what I earn, although FI is a long way off. I counted it up and I actually have more days off than on in a year, which is pretty sweet, and my workdays are shorter than usual (6.75/day). I am thinking about getting a new job for other reasons, but it's going to have to be pretty great or really well paid to make me switch.
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I would be weary of this if I was a salaried employee.
If you're not actually paid by the hour, my guess is that your workload wouldn't go down as much as your pay would (i.e. 90% of the work for 80% of the pay!)
I think I'd prefer to work "full time" and retire 20% sooner. And actually, I think it would be sooner than that because (1) your savings rate on that extra 20% salary would likely be higher than your savings rate on the first 80% of your salary and (2) the extra money you save compounds.
Like all things to do with early retirement, it all depends on your valuation of free time in the present vs. free time in the future.
I'm going to do it, so just explaining some of my thinking here. I'm not too concerned on workload. I'm salaried but have strict hour limits on projects, so that prevents excess work issues.
While it gives up 20% gross salary, it's quite a bit less after taxes. It's all at my marginal tax rate, so I don't net as much on it as the first 80%. I've already maxed my tax advantaged accounts, so no help there. My net take home per hour actually goes up as I'll make about 85% of current net for 80% of the work.
Ultimately, my fairly conservative math says I'll go from 6 years to FI to 7 years. That is 7 years at 80%, though, which actually means fewer work days over the long run. More lifetime free time, more of it now instead of later, and less stress overall outweighs an extra calendar year until total freedom for me.
Sounds like the math says it's a good decision. If my difference to FI was 1 year, I go with long weekends too.
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I actually proposed this to my employer a couple years ago and they accepted. It's been one of the better decisions I've made - it's amazing the difference that having a 3-day weekend, every weekend, can make. Before I did it, I couldn't get to early retirement soon enough, now even though I'm still saving towards it, it's not my main focus because I have a better work/life balance. One additional plus is that the marginal tax rate that you pay on the top 20% of your salary is probably higher than your overall tax rate, so a 20% cut in hours doesn't equate to a 20% cut in after-tax pay.
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Just make sure you are not expected to produce the same level of output as a full-time employee.
This would be my biggest concern. As a salaried employee, there's no way I'd agree to do the same work for 20% less pay. I'd much rather work from home.
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I am 50% time and salaried accordingly. It is all WFH so it can be difficult not to feel like I am working all the time.
I did it previously for a large corporation and really didn't work extra, because everything got left at work- I veeeery occasionally had a phone call on an off day but that was the exception not the rule.
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I would do it in a heart beat, especially if it only delays FIRE by a year. I am on the 9/80 schedule (every other Friday off) and it would have to take a big raise for me to go back to working every Friday.
This x 10000
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I would pay 1/5 of my 5 day salary. Which I did, for 7 years. It was really the best of both worlds; I kept a near-full time job but had 3 day weekends. I used my Friday to do all the things you would NOT want to do on a weekend (grocery, errands, etc) and was able to do fun kid activities with my children. It did not set back my career at all.
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DH works 9-9's and has every other Friday off. Okay, technically the other Friday he works an hour less so it averages a 40 hour work week.
It costs him nothing, and it's worth a ton.
I'm not writing to humblebrag, just to share something he recently mentioned. One of his colleagues takes Mondays, not Fridays. His reasoning? There are more Monday holidays than Fridays, so he actually comes out ahead when there's a paid holiday. Before you pull the trigger, see if that would apply to you too. We're still trying to wrap our heads around it, so I don't know all the details, but surely it's a mustachian virtue to think like a contrarian and work the system to your advantage, if it can be done.
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So my question is: what would you pay to have Fridays off?
I'd give up 20% of my gross pay plus up to another 5% if I had to. In addition to getting friday's off, that reduced pay is coming off of my marginal tax bracket, which is high. So my take home pay would reduce by less than 20%.
I wish my employer allowed this.
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Absolutely. I work 35 hour weeks and get every Friday off. I couldn't go back. Fridays are now my favorite day by far.
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Take it!! I work 9 hours M-F and only work a half day EVERY Friday. It would take a LOT for me to give that up. It gives me some time to myself and keeps me sane!
I just started doing this at the beginning of the year, and it has been amazing so far! I'm currently interviewing for another job, and am really struggling to decide whether the significantly higher pay and more interesting work would really be worth giving up this schedule and my super short commute. Good problem to have I guess, but still a tough call!
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DH works 9-9's and has every other Friday off. Okay, technically the other Friday he works an hour less so it averages a 40 hour work week.
It costs him nothing, and it's worth a ton.
I'm not writing to humblebrag, just to share something he recently mentioned. One of his colleagues takes Mondays, not Fridays. His reasoning? There are more Monday holidays than Fridays, so he actually comes out ahead when there's a paid holiday. Before you pull the trigger, see if that would apply to you too. We're still trying to wrap our heads around it, so I don't know all the details, but surely it's a mustachian virtue to think like a contrarian and work the system to your advantage, if it can be done.
That's brilliant. It won't work for me because of how we do paid time off, but that sort of thinking is great.
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It depends on the financial situation. If you are saddled with debt I am not sure I would. If you are in a good position with no debt other than a mortgage with a reasonable end goal in site, I would in a second. I would even do less. If given the chance, I would probably sign up to work 20 hours a week for the rest of my life in corporate rather than maintain the rat race full time until FI.
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Based on where we are financially, I would take a 25% cut in pay and sign that document on the spot.
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I was talking to my main client yesterday and one of their projects I am working on looks like it will shutdown by end May this year. First thing that occured to me was "scale back to 3 days a week". That happening for the start of summer is perfect. :)
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It is great to have a weekday off to run errands and do all the things that can't be done on the weekends. Personally if you can afford it, your mental health is worth it.
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I absolutely would. I worked 4-10s for 3 years before my current boss took over our department. He "asked HR" if it was OK for me to work a different schedule and they said "we don't recognize alternate work schedules" so back to 5-8s I went.
I would happily give up money to go back to 4-10s and would happily give up 20% of my income to go to 4-8s!
I realize that it's not for everyone but I suspect having to work 5 days per week will drive me to RE sooner than I would have otherwise.
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The math depends on your savings rate.
A low earner saving nearly nothing would be devastated by a 20% paycut.
Someone making 200k (after tax) with an 80% savings rate. Aka, they spend 40k a year, taking another 40k hit a year drops the savings rate from..
80% (160/200) to...
75% (120/160)
Much less of an impact!
However, the overall savings obviously drops from 160k a year to 120k a year. This is gigantic in real terms.
If your spending 100k on a 200k income the change is a lot more profound.
50% (100/200) to..
37.5% (60/160
Significantly increasing time to FIRE
So please, if your not higher up in the savings rate, do the math, this might be hard to swallow.
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Wednesday's off are better
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If you are in a high tax schedule, it doesn't cost 20% to take a day a week off.
One of my colleagues leaves home at Monday morning ridiculously early. He drives the 2-2,5 hours to work. There he works 3 looong days, sleeping for free at work. Buying dinner at work. And he drives home on Thursday afternoon after a normal working day. And stays home on Friday. He says it is a great solution.
I easily make extra hours, so sometimes I just take an extra Friday off from overtime hours. Those weekends feel just great.
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For me the question would be "what would you do for saturdays off"
I am going on 6 months of 60 hour work weeks :O
Sure beats the 82/70 hour weeks i have done before.
Sometimes it is just so hard to say NO to overtime, even more so when it is "required"
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I've recently learned that I have the option to work reduced hours with the only effects being prorated pay and vacation time. I'll keep my health insurance, paid parking, 401(k), etc. No paperwork to fill out, either. Everything just gets prorated based on hours worked, provided I'm at 32+ per week.
I've been wanting more time for myself, I'm in a good financial position, and I would really like reduced stress from 4 day weeks. All indications are that everybody in management is fine with employees taking advantage of this option, so I'm not too worried about repercussions. At least, I expect I'd get a talking to before there were any real consequences.
I'd drop about $16,000 in terms of what I take home after taxes. That would kick my FIRE date back about a year, but I'm leaning towards it anyway. Recent stress has had me considering changes, and I don't know that I'll find something that pays as well as the reduced rate with less stress. It is hard to give up that much income, though.
So my question is: what would you pay to have Fridays off?
I think it really depends on the nature of your job. If your job is more about clocking hours, or you have chunks of available unoccupied time at work, then sure, taking off Fridays or even working a flex schedule makes awesome sense. However, if your job has certain performance expectations, then working less means you will have less time to get the work done. If you can performance more efficiently during less hours, then this could work. However, if you cant then you may just be adding more stress to yourself (at lower overall pay).
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I currently work 9/80s but would take a 20% paycut in a heartbeat to get every Friday off. That extra hour on the days I work really make the days long.
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Thanks all, this is exactly what I needed to hear. I'm going to go for it. The way it's setup, I could go back to full time anytime, so long as there's space on a project.
Well there you go. Try it, and see how you like it. Report back.
Figured I should report back. I haven't worked a Friday since mid-March and am really loving it. Fridays are now my days (hey that rhymes) and it feels great to have a day where there isn't mandatory work to be done or social expectations like those that tend to fill weekends. I've done some small work around the house on Fridays, but it's not hard to do an hour or two of work in a single day and go about enjoying the rest of it off. Especially knowing that the actual weekend is coming up.
It has been a little surprising when Saturday night rolls around and it feels like the end of the weekend, only to realize there's another day off coming. I've never dreaded Mondays, but it's a nice feeling to have more weekend left regardless.
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Figured I should report back. I haven't worked a Friday since mid-March and am really loving it. Fridays are now my days (hey that rhymes) and it feels great to have a day where there isn't mandatory work to be done or social expectations like those that tend to fill weekends. I've done some small work around the house on Fridays, but it's not hard to do an hour or two of work in a single day and go about enjoying the rest of it off. Especially knowing that the actual weekend is coming up.
It has been a little surprising when Saturday night rolls around and it feels like the end of the weekend, only to realize there's another day off coming. I've never dreaded Mondays, but it's a nice feeling to have more weekend left regardless.
Good for you! If you ever want to work more again, you could also take every other Friday off as an alternative.
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I'd do it in a heartbeat. What fields are you all in that offer this? I'm in IT, and do get to work from home 1-2 days a week, which is awesome. But, mega corp has not really offered up 4 days, actually, from what I'm hearing part time jobs are getting very slim. My plan was to go to part time, once I get my nest egg to 500k. Now, I'm thinking I may have to look around at other companies for the 20-25 hours a week I want to work.
Good luck to you either way.
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I'd do it in a heartbeat. What fields are you all in that offer this? I'm in IT, and do get to work from home 1-2 days a week, which is awesome. But, mega corp has not really offered up 4 days, actually, from what I'm hearing part time jobs are getting very slim. My plan was to go to part time, once I get my nest egg to 500k. Now, I'm thinking I may have to look around at other companies for the 20-25 hours a week I want to work.
Good luck to you either way.
I work at a university, and the main reason it's 4 days is because my dept can't afford 5. But check out the universities near you, they always need IT people and they may be willing to make a part time schedule work. Even at 5 days, full time here is 33.75 hours, so 4 days is only 27, which I love.
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I'd do it in a heartbeat. What fields are you all in that offer this? I'm in IT, and do get to work from home 1-2 days a week, which is awesome. But, mega corp has not really offered up 4 days, actually, from what I'm hearing part time jobs are getting very slim. My plan was to go to part time, once I get my nest egg to 500k. Now, I'm thinking I may have to look around at other companies for the 20-25 hours a week I want to work.
Good luck to you either way.
Need to find a highly regarded company that actively promotes work life balance (and really does do it). Also, project based work supports the part time model better because it usually means working in 2 or 3 projects instead of 4.
For IT work, I've seen job sharing arrangements work too. A company needs skills x and y but neither at full time. It then make sense to get two people that both know x and y (each is stronger in one than the other) and basically get the benefits of both for a bit more than having 1 person and a lot less than 2 full time people. This way there is always someone around that can do the job (solves part of argument against part time). Again, this takes a good company that can actually think beyond norms...
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I'm considering this as well, but currently it would cost me 5 years to FIRE (which would still be early, retire after 46 vs 51). My current plan is to keep working FT until I can get a promotion in the next year or two. Getting that raise and then cutting back hours will be less than the full 20% cut I'd otherwise be facing. And I'll probably use the extra time to work on side-projects anyway, so net-net the income could even be positive in the best case!
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It's great to read about this. I'm planning to approach my boss with some version of this in the next couple of years. Currently, I'm leaning towards requesting a 1 month or so leave of absence every summer (so a 1/12 reduction in pay, and 1 month where I'd need to pay my own benefits [~$50 for dental, health and life]). I've also considered going to a 9 month teaching role (currently admin) but that would be about a 50% reduction in pay, and it isn't 50% less time or 50% easier, so that doesn't seem worth it.
I like the idea of Fridays off, though...
And, personally, I'm starting to think I should give a lot more weight to my current quality of life vs my hypothetical FIRE date (especially since it's probably something like 8 years out). A lot can happen.
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A lot can happen.
Indeed.
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I'd do it in a heartbeat. What fields are you all in that offer this? I'm in IT, and do get to work from home 1-2 days a week, which is awesome. But, mega corp has not really offered up 4 days, actually, from what I'm hearing part time jobs are getting very slim. My plan was to go to part time, once I get my nest egg to 500k. Now, I'm thinking I may have to look around at other companies for the 20-25 hours a week I want to work.
Good luck to you either way.
I work at a university, and the main reason it's 4 days is because my dept can't afford 5. But check out the universities near you, they always need IT people and they may be willing to make a part time schedule work. Even at 5 days, full time here is 33.75 hours, so 4 days is only 27, which I love.
this is a great idea, I'll look into our universities around here. I know the pay is a little less for their IT work, but the hours maybe worth it once I'm getting closer to FI.
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I'd do it in a heartbeat. What fields are you all in that offer this? I'm in IT, and do get to work from home 1-2 days a week, which is awesome. But, mega corp has not really offered up 4 days, actually, from what I'm hearing part time jobs are getting very slim. My plan was to go to part time, once I get my nest egg to 500k. Now, I'm thinking I may have to look around at other companies for the 20-25 hours a week I want to work.
Good luck to you either way.
Need to find a highly regarded company that actively promotes work life balance (and really does do it). Also, project based work supports the part time model better because it usually means working in 2 or 3 projects instead of 4.
For IT work, I've seen job sharing arrangements work too. A company needs skills x and y but neither at full time. It then make sense to get two people that both know x and y (each is stronger in one than the other) and basically get the benefits of both for a bit more than having 1 person and a lot less than 2 full time people. This way there is always someone around that can do the job (solves part of argument against part time). Again, this takes a good company that can actually think beyond norms...
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Thanks for that info.
I do see our company offers job sharing. Actually our mega corp is trying to appeal to the younger workers, and claim they offer alternate work schedules, work from home, etc... but every time i bring it up to anyone they say, oh that is allowed for IT. I think most managers are just afraid to rock the boat, or to go to HR and ask, or to have to worry about other team members being upset.
My guess, most folks wouldn't be able to afford to take less pay for less hours even if offered.
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when Kid 1 arrives i'm asking for 1 day off a week could be monday could be friday. Lots of women in the work place get this option and my boss is rather a progressive thinking in the millenial generation. I'm sure i'll be told it will stunt my career growth but they dont know how long i plan to stick around.
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when Kid 1 arrives i'm asking for 1 day off a week could be monday could be friday. Lots of women in the work place get this option and my boss is rather a progressive thinking in the millenial generation. I'm sure i'll be told it will stunt my career growth but they dont know how long i plan to stick around.
Quoting myself from page 1:
"DH works 9-9's and has every other Friday off...One of his colleagues takes Mondays, not Fridays. His reasoning? There are more Monday holidays than Fridays, so he actually comes out ahead when there's a paid holiday. Before you pull the trigger, see if that would apply to you too. We're still trying to wrap our heads around it, so I don't know all the details, but surely it's a mustachian virtue to think like a contrarian and work the system to your advantage, if it can be done."
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Wednesday's off are better
I totally agree. If I had the option of choosing a day off per week I would choose Wednesday. It breaks up the week so nicely. Plus working on Friday is not bad at least in my experience as most people are laid back knowing the weekend is ahead.
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When I was single, I worked M-Tu, F-Sa, 10 hr days. It was awesome having two days off during the week, plus Sunday off. Plus...you're never working more than 2 days in a row.
Now I work M-F, but come in early and leave early. I also buy 40 extra hours PTO at the time of open enrollment, and it costs me 40 hours of my hourly at the time I sign up. That cost is then divided by 26 and deducted from each paycheck. Basically I voluntarily take a 1.9% paycut for more time off.
Work-life balance, if possible, and if encouraged by your employer, is super awesome.