Slashdot Mirror
Star Wars Sickout
Brahmastra writes "The New York Post reports that it will cost employers $628,880,000 in lost productivity on the first two days of Star Wars Episode III - Return of the Sith . How many of you are planning to skip at least part of your workday on the first two days?"
Somehow, I'm not a bit surprised. :)
Using the numbers on the article, each of the 4.8 million employed people who will see the movie will play hooky for the full day.
So, if I want to go to a 7pm showing, I'll be costing my company my time for the whole day?
Something smells a little fishy..
It's a flawed analysis. They study implies that these people otherwise wouldn't have these days off. People who get vacation time tend to either take it when they can so as not to lose it, or they accrue it to cash in later. It's as much a part of compensation as actual pay. On the other hand, hourly employees who don't get vacation time are only costing themselves money, so there's no business loss. *Sigh*, more people who think they can model the world with incredibly flawed assumptions.
"Nature doesn't care how smart you are. You can still be wrong." - Richard Feynman
Funny thing is, according to the short stories about the bounty hunters, Boba didn't die in the Sarlacc pit.
Most people who are salaried are usually already putting in more than 40 a week. Anyone who is on the clock won't have to be paid during the time they are not at work (unless they are dishonest, in which case they are already probably screwing their employer). And losers on government subsidies already in line outside the theatres will finally be able to get back to playing Star Wars Stratego at home instead of in the rain!
Overall I think it is better for the economy than worse.
I'd take anything Rupert Murdoch says with enough salt to ruin my taste buds.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
So, when piracy finally makes the production of movies unfeasible, the economy will actually profit! How about that, MPAA?
Dude - I wish I had mod points right now.
Picking up slack for the office broad that has a "cough cough" sick kid racks up hours. Over the course of a year - in addition to her two weeks of vacation time, and the 5 sick days and a personal day, she racked up close to 130 hours of "Oh I gotta leave" time.
That's not counting her smoker time outside - which she managed to do at least ten minutes out of each hour.
_ _ _ Go for the eyes Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!
These people who are taking their days off work, they would have taken a day off for something else. They happen to enjoy Star Wars. I am not planning on running to the theater to see it, but I take off time from work every year for baseball games.
The danger in these kinds of stories is politicians might start thinking "entertainment drains productivity". Lobby groups might decide workers need less overtime protection, to make up those losses.
If you ask me, money is the least most valuable thing on earth. I'd rather take a hike through a park, or ride a bike.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
Tsk. Tsk. Just cause you can't get any doesn't mean you should take it out on the rest of us who can.
BTW, even if you single, childless folk are really as productive as you say, if everyone chose your "super productive" lifestyle, it would only last 30-40 years till everyone was too old to work... and no young 'uns to replace you.
My observation is that the less respnsibilities in life someone has, the less efficient they really are with their time. There are exceptions. However, often when meeting up with some single friends, I find they are always late, and I am always on time despitehaving to pack up two kids under the age of two.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
*looks at parent* *looks at your message* *looks at parent*
Huh? As far as I can tell you've read a little too far between the lines. Your message's parent seemed to just be complaining that they were expected to put in more time to make up for people with families.
In particular, I see no reason for you to complain about being expected to work as many hours as the single people do. If your job demands more hours than you can provide, get a job that doesn't, don't expect others to pick up the slack because you feel we have more time available than you.
Admittadely, flexibility may be an issue; if something needs rushed to completion, or you genuinely need to be away from work to look after a sick kid, I don't mind throwing in some extra time, but I expect for you to put in extra hours later to make up for it, and let me take it easy for a bit.
On a related note; for those of us who are single, particularly long term single, free time for our social lives is key to changing that. Or would you prefer we stay single so we can continue to spend more time at work so you can keep a job that expects more hours than you have available?
Actually, that the french manage to be the 5th economy with only a fifth the population of the USA and despite their 5 week holidays and so many days off clearly indicates that they are far more efficient workers than the americans...
or not
California alone would be around the 5th largest economy in the world and it has about half the population of France.
USA GDP per capita $40,100
France GDP per capita $28,700
This may be your experience, but it isn't applicable universally. At our company we strive not to place undue assumptions/expectations on either non-parents or parents. When I go early to deal with an unforeseen childcare issue or take my daughter to the doctor, I'm expected to fill out a PTO form. When my single, child-free coworker leaves early to play golf he has to do the same. (The golf scenario is increasingly common as the weather gets warm--none of your child-free employees has ever made more work for the others?).
I can appreciate your annoyance if your company doesn't use PTO and instead has that whole "sick time"/"vacation" thing working to foment suspicion between coworkers (it inevitably does). But I'm not sure you picked the right way to vent that spleen of yours-- are you mad at George Lucas or all of us irresponsible breeders? both? your company? neither? what, exactly?
yes. that's all I'm going to say in all comments from now on.
These kinds of statistics annoy the hell out of me, brought to you by the same folks who count the billions lost every nanosecond by people stealing music on P2P services and the insurmountable costs brought about by the latest Outlook worm. The simple truth is that there isn't a supercomputer in the world that can accurately predict what the costs and benefits are from these each of these events. Does the RIAA take into account how much free advertising is dished out when people sample music for free? No. Can anyone say how much is actually saved when an annoying but otherwise non-desctructive worm infects millions of computers exposing vulnerabilities that two weeks later would have been used to exploit billions in identity theft? No. Same goes for Star Wars. How many people will be going to the movies with work people? Will this be team bonding perhaps? Your company just saved $2000 per person by sending them to the movies instead of corporate teamwork bootcamp.
For the record, I am not going to ditch work to see the Episode 3. Do you think the statisticians will factor in how much I am costing my employer by standing around the office bitching that I am working instead of having fun?
The movie will be shown for more than one fucking day!
The world won't end if you don't see it for a week, a month, or even a year after it opens.
Good God, people! Get a life!
He he - that is some funny shit. It is amazing how all the 'normals' who want to have kids and do the suburban thing seem to think that the rest of us are 'rolling in the dough' and on 'easy street.' Did you ever wonder why there are more animal rights organizations than human population control causes? I have great respect for the 'family man' (woman) and ask my employees to put their family first (even at the risk of losing a customer) because nothing is more important. But just because I'm single doesn't mean I have no motivation, no drive and no incentive. Without a job I would have just as much trouble paying the mortgage and would not be able to the (different) things important to me (s.a. travel, philanthropy). That said - as the 'single guy' I volunteer for the travel and off hours so my coworkers who do have kids etc can have the 'usual' off time, sick kid care, daycare hours, etc. So there's the overt response to the (hopefully) sarcastic post.
"None of us are as dumb as all of us." - meeting mantra
Why does it always come back to the costs to business? When did they become more important to people? How about the costs to individuals caused by businesses (e.g. days cut from life-span due to job-related stress)? There's more to life than big business.
No kidding!
I seriously hate that. If your smoking impedes your work that much, maybe it's a sign that you should quit. Imagine if I took five minutes out of every hour to go out to the lobby and masturbate?
I think smokers should be put in a seperate part of the building with modified circulation systems that don't affect the rest of the building. No more smoke-break excuses. You want to smoke two packs a day during work? Great. But do it at your desk, hunkered over your work.
Well most smokers would probably prefer that to being herded outside despite any weather conditions. Smokers are marginalized and ostracized enough as it is, no need to cry about working while they're smoking. At least they're smart enough to realize they need a break from time to time, you should try walking around for no apparent reason from time to time. ;)
When you're the single person in the office, you don't have as much free time and social life as the married people think you do. Why not? Well, because it's the single person who is usually pushed into the odd houred slots (weekends, overnight, long hours, rushed deadlines) - not to mention they're usually the first chosen to have to travel on business and work holidays.
I don't care what someone's excuses are for not being able to do their job or not being able to put in the extra effort that someone else has to. If it's because you have children - that's your problem. It is NOT my problem. If you have a drug or drinking problem, it's your problem, too. NOT mine. No matter what your situation is, it is simply not anyone else's problem. You can either do the work and put in the hours or you can not. It's that simple.
I don't want to hear parents throw around excuses, as if being a parent excuses everything, anymore than I want to hear some crackhead making excuses. Both lead to someone else making up for their slack and both are unacceptable.
Next thing you know, married people are going to demand higher salaries than single people, because it's not fair that single people can spend their money on something other than two or three four year old "accidents" and their braces or schoolbooks.
The problem is that while everyoen tends to get the same amount of sick/vacation/PTO days in any given company, I think it is quite common for parents to come in late, leave early, take time out of the middle of the day or not come in at all and not have it subtracted from their alotted accured vacation/sick/PTO days.
And that is where a lot of single people get frustrated. If you have 20 days from various accruals to use in a year for whatever purpose you wish and you use them to take care of your children and household problems, that's great. If you choose to use them to go on vacation, great. If you choose not to use them at all, that's great.
But if you use them to go on vacation and then you take additional time off throughout the year for family situations and you aren't forced to account for it, it is quite unfair to everyone else.
StarWars people would piss me off if they didn't count the day off. And that was the contrast I was originally drawing. Imagine if the StarWars people took the day off, but they didn't have to count it as a sick day, vacation day or any other kind of accrued day? What if it was just not counted and they were paid for it, just like Jane Doe gets paid for the time she takes off to attend to her family?
I agree. If anything I bust my ass harder to make sure that my kids have food. I make sure I get my shit done so I don't lose my job. I may be an exception but I won't be knocked on for others actions.
I'm also 22, and work twice as many hours a week...
Call me when you're done working 80 hour weeks for 3 years and we'll talk
I think most of us have been there, including Motherfucker. If you're not careful, you're going to burn out before you're 30. These are your prime years. Use them wisely.
And don't fool yourself, working 80 hours a week is NOT twice as productive as working 40 hours a week. Not even close.
Look when you're older and have kids, you have a good idea of what's important. Get the shit done in 8 hours. Go home and spend time doing the stuff that really matters. Anything else is probably a waste of your life.
The other guy has more experience, and figured out how to get the job done in a shorter amount of time.
94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
You seem to misunderstand the words "not MY problem" *You* have the obligation to the job, *you* have the obligation to the rugrat. Nobody else's fault but your own
"At least they're smart enough to realize they need a break from time to time"
Huh?! They are not in control, buddy, the ciggies are.
They are heading out like clockwork because they are *ADDICTED*.
The monkey says, "Light up! NOW!!"
I got tired of losing out on "smoke breaks", so I started taking my own breaks when I needed them - at 30 to 50 minutes per pop. Just hop up and vaporize.
Where's Juddy? Smoke break - carton at a time...
Then your supervisor and team were twats, and you should have refused (and I say that as a parent).
Your time is your own, what you choose to do with it is nobody's business but yours. I can understand going easy on people with obvious outside commitments (such as a family, sick relative, evening course, etc), but not being harder on you just because you had free time.
What you were being told was effectively "you have no-one to complain when you work late, so we own you". Fuck that.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
I sympathise. I've felt exaclty the same way about co-worker parents in the past. It can be very frustrating.
However, I see it as an overhead of modern western society. Nowadays both parents have to work to maintain a reasonable standard of living for their kids. This was very rare for my parent's generation, but now it's the norm.
It means we all have to be a bit more flexible with each other these days.
And you can't really say "It was their decision to have kids." If nobody made that decision, we wouldn't get far as a species.
Serving Suggestion: Defrost
Wow, you managed to deduce all that from one single post on /.?
you must be the new sherlock Holmes, can you tell me who killed Lord Lucan????
'By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes'
This is very true. However, I think that the whole idea of costs to business is bullshit for another reason - we are entitled to take days off. Granted, we are talking about people using sick days to go see the movies - but we are entitled to sick days as well.
A better system for days off is - in my company anyway, Paid Time Off. Basically, let's say you are entitled to 2 weeks vacation and 5 sick days per year, that's a total of 15 days. So they just give us 15 days off, paid, for any reason or purpose.
If you get sick very often, it cuts into your vacation days. If you are healthy, you are not penalized with having fewer days off than your unhealthier coworkers. So if I choose to go see Star Wars and take a day off, it's not costing businesses anything - because those are days we are entitled to.
Quite frankly, sick days are unfair - businesses give them under the pretenses of wanting to give employees the time, but then when they do, say it's costing the business.
When I was young/single/just starting out, I faced the same situation. I put up with that for about three months, then stopped and stood my ground.
There was some discomfort, but no real problem.
The key issue was that I got my work done. That is still the key issue.
Some years later, married and with a one year old child, I put in about seven months of 60 hour weeks straight through. Everybody was pounding in overtime, some a little more productively than others. I woke up every day at the crack of dawn so that I could get home to see my kid before she went to sleep. I caught flack for the fact that I didn't stay for the dinner that they brought in every night. (No thanks, I'll go home and eat with my wife, thank you). Yeah, an hour munching bad chinese take-out sure is productive, you losers.
Unfortunately in that case, the cultural overtime was so bad I had to bail to a new job.
When I was interviewing, I made it clear that I would only work 40 per week, but that I would get my work done. Out of five interviews, only one expressed concern that my time limit demands might be a problem. I told them thanks for the time and excused myself. Out of the other four, I got three offers. I have not worked more than 40 per week since then.
Moral of the story. Determine your limits and stick by them. As long as you get your work down, you will be rewarded. If you encounter and entrenched culture of overtime, run for the nearest exit.
You got canned because all the others are in a nice little clique. Smoking is a very social activity and by not joining them you're an outsider. When it's time to cut staff, you'd be the first all the smokers would recommend.
Why can't people just watch it after work? The movie's not going anywhere. It's ridiculous to skip work just cause you want to see a movie...grow up.
Both parents don't have to work. That's all BS. There are cases where both parents have to work, but that is because they are both only make 20K a year.
If you count the tax savings, daycare savings, only needing 1 car savings, not going out for dinner so often savings, piece of mind that your children are being raised the way you want them to savings, and then stop and think if you really need the $500K home, or the $30K car, the 5K entertainment system, the name brand food thats the same as the no name food, the no name clothes that are the same as the name brand clothes. I could go on even longer. When all this stuff adds up, then the other job doesn't really make you that much, unless both jobs are making 60K a year. In which case, both parents don't need to be working in the first place.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
"however, i make my time back as a smoker :)"
Borrowed time, my friend.
Maybe your experience is that way, but my (albeit limited) experience is the opposite. Many of my married w/ children coworkers routinely come in early, stay late, etc. Other single or just married w/o children are in the door at 7:30 and out the door at 4:00. Hourly/salary has some to do with this, but its also the type of people they are, but I usually see more salary people picking up the extra work then non-salary. Classifying all married w/ children workers as slackers is just incorrectly stereotyping us.
It also helps to have a company that actually enforces sick/personal time. I get a lump of hours to use for being sick, doctors appointments for both me AND my family. If I need to stay home with a sick kid, I lose the hours. If I need to pick him up from school early, I lose the hours. If your company doesn't enforce it, then blame your company as well.
I wonder how much "productivity" we lose due to Christmas.
First off, this is supposed to be a lighthearted "this is what I'll be doing Wendesday evening" series of posts. Not this whining "married people make me work more" crap.
;-)
But, since we're already talking about it and I'm too pissed off to talk Star Wars now...
I've been on both sides of the fence. I've worked 80+ hour weeks and am now doing just about 40. The bottom line is this: if the company is having problems keeping everyone to about 40 hours a week - its the company's problem NOT anyone else's. Single people should head out at 5pm (or whatever the time happens to be) just like EVERYONE else.
Now that being said, if your team is in a crunch (which is normal to happen from time to time), there is nothing wrong with putting in extra time to help the company get through the rough patches. However, if the company is constantly in a "rough spot" and demanding more hours of people constantly, there is a problem with the company not the employees.
If you are single and being victimized, grow a pair and speak up for yourself. There is more to life than work. Like, Star Wars.