this post was submitted on 06 May 2024
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[–] [email protected] 84 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Look I feel bad for him and his family but MY FRIENDS grow a goddamn spine. Look I get it if you’re a little whatever about 60hr work weeks, that’s a boundary issue gor sure but I get it. But 120hrs for several weeks straight is just…are you fucking serious? Just tell whoever your manager is to go fuck themselves and report them to every possible organization that might listen.

[–] [email protected] 42 points 6 months ago

Yeah, at that point the moral option is to resign and, if you can't find other work, turn to burglarizing the company's executives' houses.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (1 children)

There's a 0% chance they were actually told to work that many hours. They certainly weren't discouraged from it, but you're right, at a certain point you need to simply walk away.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 months ago

Probably the ol’ “Ya know sometimes it gets busy and we gotta put our nose to the grindstone…” crap. My last company would say that and then tried to say “well that’s per project so we don’t really look to have it carry over into others.” but of course projects are always heavier near the end where excess time wouldn’t matter so I ignored that immediately.

It’s wild the kinda crap that gets pulled on people. And it never even really works, either, which is the insane part to me. You could literally show someone that working 9-4 would guarantee a doubling in productivity(a bit extreme as an example I know) and they would fight tooth and nail against it.

[–] [email protected] 67 points 6 months ago (5 children)

Would love to see a mainstream news source for this. I don't really understand how it is possible. In the best case that is 17h per day everyday of the week for weeks.

The quality of the work being done in these circumstances would be 100% garbage, I would expect, it makes no sense to do it.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I’ve done one 110 hour work week. Once. It is possible.

I did tell the manager to foxtrot oscar shortly after that week.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I did 100 then an 80, only because someone set fire to my workplace and they told us insurance was covering overtime.... I basically just sat at the entrance and turned people away.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago

Haha, been there as well. Took advantage of unlimited overtime for an easy job, but no way is it sustainable in the long term. I was waking up and clocking in immediately, only clocking out to eat and sleep.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 6 months ago

Well duh the guy said he searched twitter and found it out. It must be true, people wouldn't just lie

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago

There are reports of people dying from exhaustion from similar workloads, I remember a spate of deaths at Korean gaming cafés where some people gamed themselves to death.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Never heard/read anything that high, but 80-90hr weeks is not uncommon in investment banking (says IB analysts & associates).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago (1 children)

These are terrible sources. The stockwatcher article barely makes any sense so looks like an AI hallucination. The MSN article confirms nothing other than people are talking about it.

I'm not saying this hasn't happened but checking the source is news reading 101 in 2024, all would do well to remember this.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Fair enough. I will go look for more and better sources.

[–] [email protected] 65 points 6 months ago (5 children)

Union tradesman here, heavy industrial. The most I ever pulled in one week was 102 hours. It was for a time sensitive, round the clock, “once we start this we can’t stop until it’s done” kind of affair. Imagine two 12 hour shifts, but when you’d normally leave, you’d stay as long as you could to help get the night shift guys up and running.

It only lasted the one week, and we all made an obscene amount of money, but any longer than that and I would have had to tell them I had to go back to my usual 60 hours. I had to force myself to stay sharp because there was dangerous shit that needed to be done, I couldn’t imagine 4 weeks of it. No one should be forced into it, even commuting home after work like that is dangerous.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 6 months ago (1 children)

That's a unique case tbh. I don't think that's applicable in case of banking or any other desk jobs. That's just employers trying to squeeze the employees instead of hiring more.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 6 months ago
[–] [email protected] 22 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I don't think he went home after working that long. He'd probably just collapse to the floor and sleep until it was time to ruin himself for the company's profit.

I get that some jobs require certain attention (like you said, heavy industry. You don't cool down that chimney once it reaches temperature), but in his case? What on earth could justify that?

And even in your case, that's a failure of planning. If one person has to work THAT MANY hours it's obviously not a one person job.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 6 months ago (1 children)

You’re not wrong, but in the commercial/industrial building trades, we welcome it from time to time. I made about $3500usd that week. After taxes. The contractors count on the fact that we want some crazy overtime here and there, it’s the reason most people in my line of work have boats and shit.

In banking? You’re right, there’s no justification. You’re not going to flood an entire suburb or have a steel plant go kaboom if you stop crunching the numbers at the bank.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

You’re not wrong, but in the commercial/industrial building trades, we welcome it from time to time. I made about $3500usd that week.

Yeah, I've been there as well. But the older I get the more I hate companies counting on their staff to pull them out of their failed strategy. It's great if it's a once every few months event, but bosses tend to get too comfy with it, at least it was like that for me. And in my first job they didn't even pay that much.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Yeah. I hear you. But, when you’re already making $40+ an hour, time and half makes it $60+, and Sunday double time makes it $80+.

I’m sure you can see the allure. You can make a lot of problems go away with that kind of money.

And that’s really the key. It should cost them a lot to put us in those scenarios. That’s why you need a good strong union.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago

That’s why you need a good strong union

100% agree.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 6 months ago (1 children)

After 84 I felt like was on razors edge trying to keep up. Chores and errands were hard to keep up with and food always had to be quick (I was broke to that ment ordering food wasn't an option).

I luckily had a boss that told me to quit the other job and not to worry I was secure at that one. I would have kept working both careers if he hadn't though :/

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Yeah. It’s awful. We should never have to do it. But, I like getting the chance when I can. Nice to pay all the bills in one fell swoop off a single week of work.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

I had no other real opportunity to stay out of the rental housing trap. I would have been paying an extra couple hundred a month and putting zero dollars to equity.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 months ago

I don't think I ever did more than 60 hours a week. But then I live in Europe...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago

Even deployment overseas that's rare, like snipers going to the bathroom while maintaining position is one thing but you can't work someone that long and maintain composer.

[–] [email protected] 57 points 6 months ago

The fact that there are people here victim blaming instead of losing their shit that it wasn't just made possible for him to work so long, but probably encouraged (if not directly by his employer, then by the desperate need for money for survival, or even the artificial and external pressures of capitalist "aspiration") is fucking scary, and it's the people doing it, thinking they're above being impacted by these external pressures that are the most susceptible to them (literally participating in it now - blaming the victim exclusively serves the system that killed him and those who uphold it for their personal gain).

[–] [email protected] 34 points 6 months ago (1 children)

JFC, that's a bit over 17 hours a day, 7 days a week...

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago

And if he had practically no commute between home and work, at best he got maybe 6 hours of sleep per night. Then immediately back to work. I wonder when he had a chance to eat or use the restroom. I suppose he ate & used the restroom while he was stuck at work.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Don't let my parents see this or they'd start bragging about how they work 240 hour weeks back in the day

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago

Plus they walked 10 miles in snow, up hill both ways with no shoes

[–] [email protected] 15 points 6 months ago

120 hours? My mind just can't comprehend that and I can barely concentrate through 35.

That guy got no sense of work-life balance.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago (2 children)

What even is the math with 120-hour week? That's 5 consecutive days. How is that possible?

[–] [email protected] 17 points 6 months ago

that's 7 x 17, leaving just enough time to collapse on the office floor.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Honestly I can't even think of something to do for 17 hours a day for a whole month. Was this guy the whole department by himself?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

Probably, yeah. I worked at a bank during staffing issues and was scheduled for 65 hour weeks, but even that wasn't enough time. I usually hit 75. No overtime pay. I spent an hour every night applying for jobs and took the first offer out of there.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

My job is very behind on the workload right now that working 120 hour weeks as an individual would maybe get us caught up but no way in hell would I do that. Im surprised this person's manager even let them do it, my manager would have told somebody that it isn't worth it and to find a balance.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago

It's just impossible to stay focused that long.

Did they need just a warm body to be present?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 months ago

What in the late stage capitalist hell?

This is the only other source I could find: link

Wondering if this is real or not.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago

Absolutely monstrous.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

Aaaaand the laaand of the braaaave?