# Should the US Have a 40-Hr. Week/8 Hr. Day? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 12, 2011, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613 "2011-05-12T03:26:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2011, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/101 "2011-05-16T13:38:43Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > You encountered this neanderthal setup in exactly _which_ century? 😕 :eek: Amazingly common, sadly enough. I probably see something that outright retarded at half or more of the server rooms I see. > [@Snnipe\_70E](#): > > I am with you. But you can have some fun taking that attitude in job interviews. I have been offered, with one exception (and I found out later it was one of those “we are hiring the board member’s nephew, but we have to interview for it to look good” things), every job I’ve got an interview for–even saying up front that I absolutely insisted on working 40 hour weeks. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2011, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/102 "2011-05-18T05:34:30Z")
> [@bump](#): > > But why? Isn’t there something non work-related that you’d rather be doing in those other 16 hours a day? I know that I sure have plenty of other things I’d rather be doing. > > And… considering that it doesn’t seem to matter how well I do my job or how many hours I work; I get the same pay over a 3 year period (well 1% raise) , I see no point in working more than a 40 hour week. I answer this question here: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=13813405](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=13813405) ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2011, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/103 "2011-05-18T10:43:32Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Studies show that from 8 hours to 10 the quality of work drops off noticeably from zero to 8. After 10 hours the work is practically worthless. Which makes sense since not only the more you work, the more you’re tired, but also the longer you stay, the more likely you are doing things that aren’t nearly as much important as what you did first in the morning. Also, it might be possible that some people at least don’t work anymore when they stay longer at the office, in practice (My only evidence here is anecdotal : friends who had worked in the USA and said that people there were staying for untold hours, but hardly ever worked, spending plenty of time “socializing”, drinking coffee, reading and writing their personnal mail, surfing on the web, etc..). It also shows in statistics : last time I checked, the USA was about 4th or 5th in productivity by year, while France (with a theorical 35 hours week) was ranked somewhere like between 20th and 30th, but for productivity per hour, the ranking was almost exactly reversed (IIRC, Japanese were 1st for yearly productivity, Belgians first for hourly productivity at this time). So, Americans with their longer hours had produced more than French people at the end of the year but were producing less every hour. Note also that a mandatory X hours week typically comes with a lot of exceptions (doesn’t applies in some industries, for some jobs, agreements with unions, overtime, etc… Not even counting jobs were it should applies but never does in practice (restaurants’ employees over here, for instance). Despite the 35 hours/week limit in France, my basic work schedule is 40 hours, occasionnally more, and I don’t get overpay, just days off. Which is fine with me, I’m always in favour of more vacation time rather than more money. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2011, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/104 "2011-05-18T11:18:59Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > It became noteworthy because the coders put very lengthy, ornate, and even termination-worthy rants in the comments in the code (which was delivered to a client), and there was no way to track who did what when because we had no revision control. That sounds funny. Why wasn’t the person in charge (who ok’ed sending the code to the client) terminated? ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2011, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/105 "2011-05-18T15:06:29Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > The part you are missing is that people volunteer to do it myself included. You don’t just land in an IT job above the level of a Tier 1 help desk or entry level programmer without years of planning and training. Both of those fields have lucrative positions that some people want to work towards and the reasons that are nobody else’s business. Both of those fields also see excessive demands for unequal compensation sometimes too but that is because they are talent driven and want people to get out if they can’t make it to a better position. The general term for that is ‘competitive’ and it applies in fields as diverse as real estate and research science. Competitive fields require talent churn voluntarily or involuntarily to do what they do. Can’t some of you see why having a steady workload mandated by the government could be a bad thing in a competitive field? It would be like having a car race with the no passing flag flown from start to finish. > > Not all jobs are like that. If you don’t want to be competitive, stay out of the fields that depend on it. My husband and I were talking this morning. His team doesn’t play computer games. They don’t have time. They are too busy staying up on the latest technology when at home. Now, his field is one of those ever changing highly competitive and highly compensated ones (IT architecture). I’m not sure how you could mandate these guys not learning their field in their off time. And since their job is to learn and work with new technologies and ideas, the time they are spending “off hours” playing with technology is contributing to their jobs. I have a different issue. My job is largely a thought job. Sometimes my employer gets no value out of a day at my desk, but gets a lot of value when I’m in the tub at home and my mind wanders to the problem at hand. I saved the company hundreds of thousands in the car the other day. ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2011, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/106 "2011-05-19T02:20:42Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > My husband and I were talking this morning. > > His team doesn’t play computer games. They don’t have time. They are too busy staying up on the latest technology when at home. > > Now, his field is one of those ever changing highly competitive and highly compensated ones (IT architecture). > > I’m not sure how you could mandate these guys not learning their field in their off time. And since their job is to learn and work with new technologies and ideas, the time they are spending “off hours” playing with technology is contributing to their jobs. > > I have a different issue. My job is largely a thought job. Sometimes my employer gets no value out of a day at my desk, but gets a lot of value when I’m in the tub at home and my mind wanders to the problem at hand. I saved the company hundreds of thousands in the car the other day. Wait, your husband has a different issue from you, right? Yours is a thought job. What kind of job is his? It sounds like a thought job to me… ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/107 "2011-05-20T11:52:00Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > Wait, your husband has a different issue from you, right? Yours is a thought job. What kind of job is his? It sounds like a thought job to me… His is also a thought job. But his involves far more “staying on top of technology” than mine does. i.e. he will also think and solve problems on the way to work - but he also reads and learns at home on work related materials - I seldom do. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2011, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/108 "2011-05-20T20:47:17Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > His is also a thought job. But his involves far more “staying on top of technology” than mine does. i.e. he will also think and solve problems on the way to work - but he also reads and learns at home on work related materials - I seldom do. Do you feel that you and your husbands’ jobs are in any way typical of jobs for most American workers? I’m betting maybe five percent of jobs are thought jobs, tops. Two or three percent is closer to the truth. Should we order the general structure of our employment practices to suit you and your husband? ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/109 "2011-05-21T07:44:14Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > His is also a thought job. But his involves far more “staying on top of technology” than mine does. i.e. he will also think and solve problems on the way to work - but he also reads and learns at home on work related materials - I seldom do. You know, something is fundamentally wrong with a given industry when your job forces you to take your work home. I worked that kind of job until recently and retired to run my own business. And I hardly ever even take any work home now. Most people who take their work home just accept that it has to be done. Few stop to think, “Hey, I’m not even getting paid for this”. And the sad part is? Many who do this are not even getting profit sharing or stock options, which is the only honest way of telling an employee that they have a stake in the company’s success. No, Government regulations won’t stop this crap from happening. However, people who have to take their work home have the biggest opportunities to take company IP somewhere else, or to even start their own businesses and run their employer out of the game. I wish it would happen more often just to bite employers in the ass who encourage this kind of at-home overtime. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/110 "2011-05-21T14:01:46Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > You know, something is fundamentally wrong with a given industry when your job forces you to take your work home. I worked that kind of job until recently and retired to run my own business. And I hardly ever even take any work home now. > > Most people who take their work home just accept that it has to be done. Few stop to think, “Hey, I’m not even getting paid for this”. And the sad part is? Many who do this are not even getting profit sharing or stock options, which is the only honest way of telling an employee that they have a stake in the company’s success. > > No, Government regulations won’t stop this crap from happening. However, people who have to take their work home have the biggest opportunities to take company IP somewhere else, or to even start their own businesses and run their employer out of the game. I wish it would happen more often just to bite employers in the ass who encourage this kind of at-home overtime. Why is there something fundamentally wrong with it? I don’t mind it. My husband doesn’t mind it. Our jobs are flexible - if we need to be out Wednesday afternoon it usually isn’t a problem. And we get paid enough that by 40 our house was paid off, by 43 our kids had fully funded college educations, and we could semi-retire if we desired. There is something wrong with not being properly compensated for the work you do. There is nothing wrong with working long hours or taking work home if you are properly compensated and the arrangement is mutually agreeable. What is wrong is when an uninvolved third party sticks their nose in your perfectly acceptable and mutually beneficial arrangement. ---
**Author:** ![Snnipe\_70E](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5a626/32.png) [@Snnipe\_70E](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snnipe_70E)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/111 "2011-05-21T16:33:24Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > You encountered this neanderthal setup in exactly _which_ century? 😕 :eek: About 5 years ago. One look at the place and I figured they were getting what they were paying for. Louse work conditions, louse workers. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2011, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/112 "2011-05-22T19:54:04Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Why is there something fundamentally wrong with it? I don’t mind it. My husband doesn’t mind it. Our jobs are flexible - if we need to be out Wednesday afternoon it usually isn’t a problem. And we get paid enough that by 40 our house was paid off, by 43 our kids had fully funded college educations, and we could semi-retire if we desired. > > There is something wrong with not being properly compensated for the work you do. There is nothing wrong with working long hours or taking work home if you are properly compensated and the arrangement is mutually agreeable. What is wrong is when an uninvolved third party sticks their nose in your perfectly acceptable and mutually beneficial arrangement. Nobody cares if you work night and day and love it. What they care about is others, who don’t want to work endless hours having to do it and not get compensated for it. We are at the beginning of a push that will take away the rights of the workers more and more. Heavy unemployment gives the company all the leverage. They will use it to lower wages, remove benefits and force workers to obey . They will not reduce exec pay though. ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/113 "2011-05-23T15:15:11Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Why is there something fundamentally wrong with it? I don’t mind it. My husband doesn’t mind it. Our jobs are flexible - if we need to be out Wednesday afternoon it usually isn’t a problem. And we get paid enough that by 40 our house was paid off, by 43 our kids had fully funded college educations, and we could semi-retire if we desired. > > There is something wrong with not being properly compensated for the work you do. There is nothing wrong with working long hours or taking work home if you are properly compensated and the arrangement is mutually agreeable. What is wrong is when an uninvolved third party sticks their nose in your perfectly acceptable and mutually beneficial arrangement. It’s not as black and white as that. First of all, lots of salaried people get stuck with mandatory unpaid overtime. So they’re not being compensated for a lot of the work they do; plus many also don’t get stock options or profit sharing. Employers take them for granted, especially in this economic climate. Worse yet, the more people you have doing overtime, the less you need to hire anyone else. Fewer workers putting out more production; it’s the entire nature of our ever-increasing GDP. This hurts the entire country, which makes us all “second” parties, because everyone has to bear the cost of workers doing overtime: more stress, fewer jobs, more strain on our social safety net, lower tax revenues (since that work is not being paid for), etc. Second, employers use peer pressure to force others into giving free work (as in unpaid overtime), at best. Equally as often, they simply fire you (or lay you off or eliminate your position) if you don’t comply with even the most onerous demands, even as bad as 20 or more hours of overtime. In short: overtime is often NOT voluntary, and in sufficient quantities it negatively affects society at large. Working people overtime is a strong sign that the company is poorly managing their workforce, and at worst, is trying to get work for free. Especially when it involves people without stock options or profit sharing. BTW congrats on having most of your life goals achieved by 43. Not too many people can even dream of that anymore. ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/114 "2011-05-23T15:24:09Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > As for the OP, many companies have instituted 4-day work weeks, often at the request of the employees, with a longer day, but 3 days off a week instead of 2. It’s very popular. I don’t like the idea of the government micro managing this sort of stuff, especially at the federal level. CA has a breif stint in the world of allowing over 8 to not be OT and at the amusement park I worked at, it was a dream given form. If it was busy, the owners would let people stay on, by request you could work 10-12 hour shifts and get a hefty chunk of your paycheck in 3 days. Since many entertainment centric businesses are heavy on weekends it allowed the park to operate on fewer bodies getting more hours and those employees were fairly happy campers because they had steady full time work. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/115 "2011-05-23T17:20:00Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > It’s not as black and white as that. > > First of all, lots of salaried people get stuck with mandatory unpaid overtime. So they’re not being compensated for a lot of the work they do; plus many also don’t get stock options or profit sharing. Employers take them for granted, especially in this economic climate. Worse yet, the more people you have doing overtime, the less you need to hire anyone else. Fewer workers putting out more production; it’s the entire nature of our ever-increasing GDP. This hurts the entire country, which makes us all “second” parties, because everyone has to bear the cost of workers doing overtime: more stress, fewer jobs, more strain on our social safety net, lower tax revenues (since that work is not being paid for), etc. > > Second, employers use peer pressure to force others into giving free work (as in unpaid overtime), at best. Equally as often, they simply fire you (or lay you off or eliminate your position) if you don’t comply with even the most onerous demands, even as bad as 20 or more hours of overtime. > > In short: overtime is often NOT voluntary, and in sufficient quantities it negatively affects society at large. > > Working people overtime is a strong sign that the company is poorly managing their workforce, and at worst, is trying to get work for free. Especially when it involves people without stock options or profit sharing. > > BTW congrats on having most of your life goals achieved by 43. Not too many people can even dream of that anymore. Yep. But as you said, it isn’t black and white. You can’t control an attorney who takes briefs home with him to read. Or a developer who learns another language in the evening. Put controls around “mandatory” overtime - fine, I’m good with that, but beware of the unintended consequences of that action. Work is competitive. And those willing to put in the extra time are the ones likely to be rewarded (not always, sometimes its nepotism, or luck. But without some competitive edge, working forty hours with the attitude ‘that’s all I get paid for’ probably isn’t going to result in being in a situation where you can realize your financial life goals by 43). In many places, there are people willing to work that overtime - if it becomes optional, you’ll find the people who will work it anyway and hire them - if that is how you choose to run your business. ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/116 "2011-05-23T17:47:01Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Yep. But as you said, it isn’t black and white. You can’t control an attorney who takes briefs home with him to read. Or a developer who learns another language in the evening. Put controls around “mandatory” overtime - fine, I’m good with that, but beware of the unintended consequences of that action. Work is competitive. And those willing to put in the extra time are the ones likely to be rewarded (not always, sometimes its nepotism, or luck. But without some competitive edge, working forty hours with the attitude ‘that’s all I get paid for’ probably isn’t going to result in being in a situation where you can realize your financial life goals by 43). > > In many places, there are people willing to work that overtime - if it becomes optional, you’ll find the people who will work it anyway and hire them - if that is how you choose to run your business. You can require that the company (those over x00 employees) award either profit sharing benefits or stock options to those who are mandated to work overtime. Oh and you don’t get to realizing your financial goals by 43 by working overtime. You get there mainly by being lucky. If you pick the right industry to jump into at the right time and apply the right amount of effort in the right place, you get to retire in your 40s. ---
**Author:** ![BlinkingDuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eada6e/32.png) [@BlinkingDuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlinkingDuck)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/117 "2011-05-23T18:51:40Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > 1. Fewer people will want to start their own business even if your second statement is true because they already have well paying jobs with stable and perfectly manageable demands. There is little reason to take big risks in society #2. There was a time when I would have believed the above whole heartedly. It makes sense. It might even be true. However, I had kids. My parents really believed in the ‘you gotta be tough’ philosophy. They were not big into helping their kids and thought helping their kids was hurting them. I got shit nothing growing up. Because of this, I coddled my kids. They did not lack for much growing up. Shit, I probably spoiled them rotten. I worried that I was hurting them by doing this…that I really should be ‘getting them toughened up’. You know what? They are doing fine as adults. I look at my parents family and kids and they all pretty much had the ‘toughen up’ philosophy and their kids seem to be having some issues. I wonder what would have happened to me if I had grown up under my type of parenting then what I actually grew up under. Maybe I would have flew high into the stars 🙂 While Society 1 above may really provide more innovation…I no longer buy into the fact that a stable, reasonably comfortable existance in Society 2 will necessarily hurt innovation because people are content. This contentment may actually inspire more innovation. Hell, just the fact that one could find another stable job may make the risk in doing your own start up company seem not so risky while, in society 1, people cling to whatever slim reed they have in a storm. Sometimes being subjected to nasty forces just makes you diminished while others living under stability, light and sun and birds chirping makes them stronger. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/118 "2011-05-24T02:21:23Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > You can require that the company (those over x00 employees) award either profit sharing benefits or stock options to those who are mandated to work overtime. > > Oh and you don’t get to realizing your financial goals by 43 by working overtime. You get there mainly by being lucky. If you pick the right industry to jump into at the right time and apply the right amount of effort in the right place, you get to retire in your 40s. I have both profit sharing and stock options. So does my husband. That doesn’t mean there has been profit to share, and our options are underwater. We haven’t made much on profit sharing or stock options for the past three years…maybe not anything. Stock option plans are really expensive to administer…the accounting rules for them are horrid and they are a really costly way to give employees ownership. Stock options, IMHO, should be dropped for EVERYONE as a compensation mechanism. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/119 "2011-05-24T02:25:14Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > You can require that the company (those over x00 employees) award either profit sharing benefits or stock options to those who are mandated to work overtime. > > Oh and you don’t get to realizing your financial goals by 43 by working overtime. You get there mainly by being lucky. If you pick the right industry to jump into at the right time and apply the right amount of effort in the right place, you get to retire in your 40s. Did you get to the point where you can semi-retire at 43? I’ve been in a shit industry for the past dozen years. I got there by working enough to climb the corporate ladder to being a highly paid employee - and being pretty darn frugal in my day to day life. My industry sucks - and has for the twelve years I’ve been in it. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613/120 "2011-05-24T03:01:36Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Stock option plans are really expensive to administer…the accounting rules for them are horrid and they are a really costly way to give employees ownership. Stock options, IMHO, should be dropped for EVERYONE as a compensation mechanism. I’m personally more in favor of ESOPs than I am of options, but then again, my ESOP’s value amortized over my tenure has amounted to about 2.5% of my gross salary. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-the-us-have-a-40-hr-week-8-hr-day/581613.md?page=7)