Bush: work longer hours

[Darat]

Public policy? No. I'm just illustrating that most successful people work more than 40 hours. I also wonder why such an obvious solution to the problem (want more=work more) encounters such resistance.

Your anecdote doesn't illustrate that most successful people work more than 40 hours.

 

[Mudcat]

Your anecdote doesn't illustrate that most successful people work more than 40 hours.

In fact, the concept of "work smarter, not harder" kind of negates that notion.

 

[surrogate]

. When we were on food stamps I was a computer lab tech for the school district and I worked a few nights a week and every weekend as a waiter. My wife went to school over full time and worked retail as well. The jobs are there and it's not difficult to coordinate schedules is you want it.

Amazing how so many people manage to make it work, then. My daughter works at three different restaurants and manages to make it work. If you want it, you will work it out.

Its just a counter-story to the narrative that it can't work. It can.

So you were lucky enough to have a job at a school, which usually close in the early to mid afternoon, and have a server job in the evening, therefore it isn't difficult for anyone else to coordinate schedules for multiple jobs? And somehow, even with income from three separate employers between you and your wife, you managed to qualify for food stamps (aka EG3K's stolen money). So, were you underpaid or did you just choose not to work long and hard enough?

I though you owned a restaurant. Why doesn't your daughter just work full time at your business?

 

[Bogative]

Because that's not what Jeb was talking about.

Yes, it was.

Its what he wanted you to think he's talking about,

A mind reader, I see?

While those who can hear his anti-Obamacare and pro-business-right-to-screw-the-worker dog whistle get the real meaning.

Sounds like a vast right-wing conspiracy.


Here is what he said in case you missed it earlier:

QUESTION: To keep us from taking it out of context, what you meant to say — when you say more hours you mean full-time work.

BUSH: Given the opportunity to work. Yeah, absolutely.

QUESTION: Not that a full-time guy or somebody working two jobs needs to be working even more time.

BUSH: Absolutely not.

http://www.businessinsider.com/jeb-bush-work-more-hours-quote-2015-7

 

[mgidm86]

Even if he is, he's still out of touch. I don't know if you work full-time but it sucks. Full-time work means that you spend forty hours (or more) a week at the workplace which translates into eight to twelve hours at work for most of the week, usually at undesirable hours.

You never get any time for friends, family, or other loved ones because you spend half the day at work, the other half sleeping it off. All to slave away to do likely menial work for just enough money to get by.

I've read all the posts since this one.

People have been working 40 hour weeks or more for a very long time. You say we "shouldn't" need to work so much, but what do you mean by shouldn't? Who should guarantee that we don't need to do this? Are you special? Not trying to be a jerk, honestly, but this sounds like you're claiming "poor me" in a room full of other suckers like us. Ya, we all live in the same world you do.

You've worked long hours at minimum wage, of course you will barely scrape by. I had roommates when I worked for cheap, you had an apartment for yourself, from what I understand. Those are decisions each of us made. Some people go to night school to learn a trade, or get a degree. It's what we do. You want more, you work more.

I'm having a hard time understanding where you're coming from. I hear a lot of younger people today say the same things as you are so maybe you're one of them. Again, I'm not trying to be a jerk, I'm just not sure how else to put it.

 

[332nd]

Having done it, I can see that it is not absurd and is in fact the way most successful people live. The richest man and biggest Democratic Party bundler in my neck of the woods is the hardest working man I know. The President of the bank I use works quite a bit more than 40 hours. Every doctor I know personally works more than 40. I can't think of one rich person I personally know that works less than "overtime."

If all those people are willing to work so hard for what they have, why shouldn't even the lowliest wage earner as well?

Rich & making a decent living are two different things.

 

[BenBurch]

20 hours should be considered "full time" and the reason is that we are on the verge of a jobless future. Robots will do most jobs in 15 years. Including taxi driver. Including janitor. Including blueberry picker.

 

[Mudcat]

People have been working 40 hour weeks or more for a very long time. You say we "shouldn't" need to work so much, but what do you mean by shouldn't?

What's difficult to understand? Someone working 40 hour weeks should be able to live comfortably just on that. No need to work two other jobs or massive amounts of over time. No need to sacrifice sleep, health, and all of one's time with friends, family, and loved ones.

Who should guarantee that we don't need to do this?

I don't know, I honestly don't. But it should be done now before future generations where the ability to work even forty hour work weeks is rendered obsolete by future developments in automation.

Are you special?

No. Are you?

Not trying to be a jerk, honestly, but this sounds like you're claiming "poor me" in a room full of other suckers like us. Ya, we all live in the same world you do.

Prove it.

You've worked long hours at minimum wage, of course you will barely scrape by. I had roommates when I worked for cheap, you had an apartment for yourself, from what I understand.

Believe it or not I actually miss those days at times. I didn't bemoan my circumstances at the time and I was actually happy, despite living in what some would call poverty.

Those are decisions each of us made. Some people go to night school to learn a trade, or get a degree. It's what we do. You want more, you work more.

I don't object to the notion that one should work more to get more except for the fact that it completely flies in the face of reality.

Many of the most successful individuals in society didn't work half as hard as the working stiff struggling just to get the bills paid. I don't hold it against those who are most successful, although I know that it might sound like I do. What I do take issue with is that working stiffs need to struggle just to get the bills paid.

And that is what I mean it shouldn't be this way.

 

[shemp]

I have a comfortable life because I work hard, sometimes all day and night, to achieve it. Look at any successful person. Do you honestly think they work 8 hours or less a day?

Do you honestly think that those of us who work an 8-hour day are failures?

It's nice that's you own a business and your wife is a doctor; I'm sure you both get well remunerated for your time and labor. But you have some choice in the matter. You've chosen to operate a business; your wife has chosen to be a doctor; both professions are very time-demanding. Most people who work more than 40 hours a week don't have a choice. A lot of them are paid minimum wage or not much more and have to work those hours to feed, house and clothe their family. Do you think that people who work a 40-hour week should be paid enough to do that without having to work those extra hours? Or do you think it's fine that people should have no choice but to work those extra hours?

 

[wareyin]

Do you honestly think that those of us who work an 8-hour day are failures?

It's nice that's you own a business and your wife is a doctor; I'm sure you both get well remunerated for your time and labor. But you have some choice in the matter. You've chosen to operate a business; your wife has chosen to be a doctor; both professions are very time-demanding. Most people who work more than 40 hours a week don't have a choice. A lot of them are paid minimum wage or not much more and have to work those hours to feed, house and clothe their family. Do you think that people who work a 40-hour week should be paid enough to do that without having to work those extra hours? Or do you think it's fine that people should have no choice but to work those extra hours?

In my experience with small businesses, often the owners are working long hours, so long as one counts playing clients on the golf course, or taking clients to dinners/bars/strip clubs.
Of course, in all instances I have direct experience with, the small business owners inherited the business from their father, or bought an established business with money inherited from their father.

 

[Corsair 115]

For what it's worth, from the BLS here is the annual averages for persons at work in agriculture and nonagricultural industries by hours of work. If one looks specifically at full-time workers in non-agricultural industries and does the percentages, the distribution of hours worked looks like this:

35-39 hours: 9.0%
40 hours: 57.9%
41-48 hours: 11.5%
49-59 hours: 12.9%
60+ hours: 8.7%

So 21.6% of U.S. non-agricultural industry workers—that's one in five—work 49 or more hours per week.