I’m a cashier. When there’s no customers, I do clean up–picking up this dumped by the registers and putting them in the “returns” cart. Almost a break.
This time of year, we can either take a 15 minute paid break once every four hours, oe a 30 minute unpaid break every six hours. I opt for 15 minutes.
One could argue that all work time is wasted, if not spent actually accomplishing any productive work. Not to be confused with sitting in your cubicle looking busy.
The purposes of the prevailing work/pay paradigm in our ecomony are best served by the model of the working being paid for the minutes or hours spent in the workplace, rather than moving toward the employer’s goal of turning out the product/service to be sold for profit.
This has resulted in the sad politic of a society in which people are given a share of the economy in exchange for being at the boss’s beck and call, without regard to whether any useful work is actually performed. For example, if a diligent and efficient worker can do in 30 hours what the employers expects to have done in 40 hours, why should he not be paid the full week’s wage for 30 hours’ work? It’s because our Calvinist ethic has not changed, despite modernization of the production capacity. In fact the ethic has actually impeded progress in industrial thinking, by muddying the goals of both organized labor and the management of the wealth and the means to produce it, for the sake of an anachronistic dogma.
IOW. the only way to fund your consumption is to “get a job”…regardless of whether there is anything useful that can be done on behalf of the owners of the capital
For three years I have had to meet quotas so no slacking off. But the dept next to mine has that just in case scenario. They were encouraged to bring books/magazines as no internet/phone use was allowed at your desk (only lunchtime/breaktime).
At my previous job was like that too, most of volume was during the day and the evening shift was there just in case there was work, Mostly wasn’t so they read too or walked around hanging out.
I get in between 6:45am and 7:00am and that’s when I start-- but when I wrap up everything that needs to be get done that day can vary a lot! So that’s why I happen to be posting on a message board before 3pm on a Wednesday afternoon 
One of my first “professional” jobs was with the US Government (cough-USGS-cough). I remember one fellow there, I recall he was at one time a professional baseball player, anyway, I noticed he would saunter-in around 9:00, grab a cup of coffee, stir the creamer in just right, say hello to a few people, shoot the breeze while drinking said cup, and finally sit-down at his desk around 10:00. By 11 or 11:30 he would be wrapping-up whatever he “worked” on, and get ready for lunch. Then he’d be back around 1:30-ish, and get back to his 1+ hour of “work” and then make more rounds shooting the breeze with people. He’d disappear around 4:00.
I had another co-worker who would ask her team member to go to her office at 9:00 and turn on the light, so-as to look like she was in the office already (she was not). That same company, me and others would chat for an hour at a time, and we were doing a lot of day trading as well (unsuccessfully).
Currently, I arrive between 8:00 and 8:30, but if you try to schedule a meeting before 9:00 no one will show-up. For some people it is before 10:00 (but some of them work really late, so no complaints). Mostly teleconferences. Prime time for meetings is 9:00 - 5:00, and most people are really working most of this time - not too many just walking around shooting the breeze. Not too much wasted time here (except when taking a break on the Dope, but that’s not really a waste, is it?).
I work in a college helpdesk and we are treated like adults. You are expected to answer phones and close tickets, but no one checks. The result is that we get the job done and people are happy.
At the same time, no one abuses things. No long lunches and we all go out immediately when something comes up.