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brooklynite

(93,867 posts)
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 11:08 AM Mar 2023

This country wanted a 69-hour workweek. Millennials and Generation Z had other ideas

CNN

Shorter workweeks to boost employee mental health and productivity may be catching on in some places around the world, but at least one country appears to have missed the memo.

The South Korean government was this week forced to rethink a plan that would have raised its cap on working hours to 69 per week, up from the current limit of 52, after sparking a backlash among Millennials and Generation Z workers.

Workers in the east Asian powerhouse economy already face some of the longest hours in the world – ranking fourth behind only Mexico, Costa Rica and Chile in 2021, according to the OECD – and death by overwork (“gwarosa”) is thought to kill scores of people every year.

Yet the government had backed the plan to increase the cap following pressure from business groups seeking a boost in productivity – until, that is, it ran into vociferous opposition from the younger generation and labor unions.

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This country wanted a 69-hour workweek. Millennials and Generation Z had other ideas (Original Post) brooklynite Mar 2023 OP
More productivity? Johnny2X2X Mar 2023 #1
Many people need the income from working more than 32-36 hrs a week MichMan Mar 2023 #8
I get that Johnny2X2X Mar 2023 #9
I don't understand how an abbreviated work week is more profitable MichMan Mar 2023 #11
Your Numbers Are Solid ProfessorGAC Mar 2023 #12
Birth Rate exoskeleton Mar 2023 #2
There are huge social problems ahead for S. Korea irisblue Mar 2023 #10
Bean counter logic. More hours more work! Oneironaut Mar 2023 #3
The unraveling of 100 years of labor reforms Trenzalore Mar 2023 #4
In South Korea? MichMan Mar 2023 #7
More hours at work will never help raise birth rates, especially in a misogynist country. irisblue Mar 2023 #5
So in a country of intense manosphere Andrew Tate influenced end stage capitalism irisblue Mar 2023 #6

Johnny2X2X

(18,745 posts)
1. More productivity?
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 11:43 AM
Mar 2023

Not. We already know 32-36 hour work weeks are the most productive and profitable for the employer.

The idea that working more than 36 hours is better in anyway for workers and employers is rooted in dogma that is simply false.

Johnny2X2X

(18,745 posts)
9. I get that
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 01:02 PM
Mar 2023

But businesses would be better off paying them better to work 36 solid hours. This isn’t new, this isn’t theory, we know better rested workers with a better work life balance are more profitable. We’re just stuck in this rut that too many in charge think more work is better.

MichMan

(11,789 posts)
11. I don't understand how an abbreviated work week is more profitable
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 03:42 PM
Mar 2023

I spent my career working technical support in smaller manufacturing plants. Our normal work hours for manufacturing production was five 8 hour days (plus some Saturday's if necessary). The plant investment in machinery and equipment can be pretty substantial, and the profitability depends on them producing parts for as many hours as possible to meet customer demand.

Let's say the machine cycle time can produce 30 widgets per hour or 240 per an 8 hour shift. Each machine requires 3 workers to operate the work cell. Since the machine cycle time dictates the output, that is the limit.

If production is scheduled for 8 hours a day, Monday-Thursday for 32 hours, there are 960 widgets made. In a 5 day 40 hour workweek, the same work cell would have already made the exact same number of 960 widgets the first 4 days of the week, (with an entire additional day of capacity to be made on Friday).

It is impossible in a 32 hour work week to manufacture more pieces than can be made in 40 hours. How could it possibly be more productive and profitable to only run 32 hours a week and have machines sitting idle for 20% of the available time ? Doesn't make any sense.

Note; There are some manufacturing plants that operate on a 4 day a week schedule, but they work 10 hours a day for 40 hours, and it is a rotating schedule, so people don't work the same 4 days every week.

ProfessorGAC

(64,425 posts)
12. Your Numbers Are Solid
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 04:00 PM
Mar 2023

It does, however, differ for transactional work.
In my field, in the operating site labs, it was well established that the number of analyses done per hour went down & the % of accurate results went down in an obvious way at 40 hours. An starts trending down at around 36 hours.
Because the labs were 24/7 shifts meant some weeks were over 42 hours, some under 40. But, this meant there was a huge dataset.
(One of my direct reports did the study & the report.) We were able to justify laboratory headcount because tge study proved overtime created more cost over a year than another person or two.
Where the work isn't hardware limited, productivity per unit time can definitely be affected by hours beyond 40.

irisblue

(32,829 posts)
10. There are huge social problems ahead for S. Korea
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 01:08 PM
Mar 2023

Posted too quick
On S. Korea and it's massive misogyny problem


https://www.eastasiaforum.org/2022/12/09/south-koreas-misogyny-problem/

snip-"During the 2022 South Korean presidential race, conservative candidate Yoon Suk-yeol denied that structural inequality between men and women exists and threatened to abolish the Ministry of Family and Gender Equality. He narrowly won the presidency in March 2022 by catering to young men, who overwhelmingly believe that discrimination against men in South Korea is severe.

Yet Korea ranks low in global indexes of gender equality, such as the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report. Incidents of violence against women, including domestic assault, workplace sexual harassment, rape and murder have become alarmingly frequent. In a 2015 study by the South Korean government, 80 per cent of respondents — the vast majority of whom were women — reported they had been sexually harassed in their workplace. Human Rights Watch reported that nearly 80 per cent of male respondents admitted to violent acts against an intimate partner in a 2017 survey.

Women constitute more than half of South Korea’s reported homicide victims — one of the highest gender ratios in the world. In September 2022, a female employee of the Seoul subway system was beaten to death in a subway station restroom by a male co-worker who had stalked and threatened her for three years. Similar deaths occurred in prior years. According to the South Korean Supreme Prosecutor’s Office, 90 per cent of the victims of violent crime in 2019 were women, a significant increase from 71 per cent in 2000.

Digital sex crimes have become an epidemic in one of the most wired nations in the world. Men have set up spy cameras in public bathrooms, women’s locker rooms, stores and subways to film women, distributing the videos online without consent. Less than 4 per cent of sex crime prosecutions involved illegal filming in 2008, but the number rose to 20 per cent in 2017."

much more there.

Last post.

https://www.npr.org/2022/12/03/1135162927/women-feminism-south-korea-sexism-protest-haeil-yoon

snip-"It's a response to an anti-feminist wave that has swept across South Korea, creating a tense gender war where discourse around women's rights is taboo and men claim they are now the victims of gender discrimination."

more there

Trenzalore

(2,331 posts)
4. The unraveling of 100 years of labor reforms
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 11:53 AM
Mar 2023

Sure, trust the big companies. They will do right by their workers.

MichMan

(11,789 posts)
7. In South Korea?
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 12:54 PM
Mar 2023

Last edited Sun Mar 19, 2023, 04:18 PM - Edit history (1)

What 100 years of labor reforms are you referring to?

irisblue

(32,829 posts)
5. More hours at work will never help raise birth rates, especially in a misogynist country.
Sun Mar 19, 2023, 12:00 PM
Mar 2023

In South Korea, the fertility rate — the average number of children born to a woman in her reproductive years — is now 0.78, according to figures released by the Korean government in February.5 hours ago

https://www.npr.org › 2023/03/19
South Korea's fertility rate, the lowest in the world, holds lessons for us all


https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/south-korea-hits-record-low-weddings-amid-plunging-birth-rate-3866002


snip-"Some 192,000 couples got married last year, according to the data released by Statistics Korea Thursday, down by more than 40 percent from a decade earlier in 2012, when 327,000 couples had wed.

This is the lowest number of marriages in a year since records began in 1970."

Slsnip-" Experts say there are multiple causes for the twin phenomenon of low marriage and birth rates, from high child-rearing costs and property prices to a notoriously competitive society that makes well-paid jobs difficult to secure.

The double burden for working mothers of carrying out the brunt of household chores and childcare while also maintaining their careers is another key factor, experts say."

more there


On S. Korea and it's massive misogyny problem


https://www.eastasiaforum.org/2022/12/09/south-koreas-misogyny-problem/

snip-"During the 2022 South Korean presidential race, conservative candidate Yoon Suk-yeol denied that structural inequality between men and women exists and threatened to abolish the Ministry of Family and Gender Equality. He narrowly won the presidency in March 2022 by catering to young men, who overwhelmingly believe that discrimination against men in South Korea is severe.

Yet Korea ranks low in global indexes of gender equality, such as the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report. Incidents of violence against women, including domestic assault, workplace sexual harassment, rape and murder have become alarmingly frequent. In a 2015 study by the South Korean government, 80 per cent of respondents — the vast majority of whom were women — reported they had been sexually harassed in their workplace. Human Rights Watch reported that nearly 80 per cent of male respondents admitted to violent acts against an intimate partner in a 2017 survey.

Women constitute more than half of South Korea’s reported homicide victims — one of the highest gender ratios in the world. In September 2022, a female employee of the Seoul subway system was beaten to death in a subway station restroom by a male co-worker who had stalked and threatened her for three years. Similar deaths occurred in prior years. According to the South Korean Supreme Prosecutor’s Office, 90 per cent of the victims of violent crime in 2019 were women, a significant increase from 71 per cent in 2000.

Digital sex crimes have become an epidemic in one of the most wired nations in the world. Men have set up spy cameras in public bathrooms, women’s locker rooms, stores and subways to film women, distributing the videos online without consent. Less than 4 per cent of sex crime prosecutions involved illegal filming in 2008, but the number rose to 20 per cent in 2017."

much more there.

Last post.

https://www.npr.org/2022/12/03/1135162927/women-feminism-south-korea-sexism-protest-haeil-yoon

snip-"It's a response to an anti-feminist wave that has swept across South Korea, creating a tense gender war where discourse around women's rights is taboo and men claim they are now the victims of gender discrimination."

more there

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