The Life of Leisure: Once Upon a Time, the Workweek Was a Lot Shorter
By Eben Shapiro
So this is progress? Many Europeans today get six or more weeks of vacation a year, making them the envy of the rest of the world -- especially working stiffs in America, who usually start with a mere two weeks a year.
But to European peasants in the 12th and 13th centuries, even six weeks would sould barbaric. Back then, when many Christian holy days were holidays, Spanish laborers got a miraculous five months a year off, thanks in large part to all the saints' days. French workers had it tougher -- they got only four months of holidays annually.
Medieval lives may have been miserable in many ways, but not in terms of work schedules. Indeed, while there technically was a six-day workweek -- Sunday being the only official day of rest -- going to work on Monday was all but optional in many places. Many laborers spent Monday's at home recovering from the previous night's drinking bout, leading it to be dubbed, tongue-in-cheek, St. Monday....
[T]he amount of time spent working [today] would come as a surprise to George Bernard Shaw and other turn-of-the-century utopians. They predicted that by the end of the millennium, people would labor just a few hours a day to meet their needs and would spend the rest of their time nurturing their souls.
Instead, many labor experts say the number of hours for many white-collar jobs is expanding, even though the official workday is shorter. Says Benjamin Kline Hennicutt, a professor of leisure studies at the University of Iowa: "Work is a secular religion that is spreading."
[end of excerpt]
One interesting corollary to this perverse trend is the rise of what I call "stunt work" among white-collar types. The actual quality of what you produce isn't as important as the (almost always pointless) rigors under which you produced it, "multi-tasking on the red-eye," etc. I've noted a strong tendency among co-workers to put in late nights, and *not* just because we're in a billable-hour field. Seems to be a feeling that burning the midnight oil at the office ennobles whatever you're up to, however preposterous it may be.
Carl Remick