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Comment by dpritchett | Hacker News Reader

If you like your work enough to put in 80 hours a week on it please ensure that the additional 40 hours reward you in some equitable way.

If you want to work the extra 40 hours for free you can do it for a charity (or your own startup!) rather than your for-profit employer.

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Why so much respect for charities? They are often hopelessly inefficient. If somebody wants to work extra for their employer, let them do it.

It's the opportunity cost. When you provide an employer with unpaid labor they profit at the expense of your family/hobby/startup/charity/mental health.

Your extra time could be devoted to the benefit of people, projects, or causes dearer than your employer's pockets.

> "When you provide an employer with unpaid labor..."

Programming jobs don't pay overtime?! With an extra 40 hrs/wk, regardless of the job, the employee should get a sizable compensation, right?

Corporate programmers in the US are usually salaried. Salaried programmers are exempt from overtime thanks to the Department of Labor: http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/fairpay/fs17e_compute...

If I work them them, I'd rather the company fire the one who wants to routinely work 80 hours a week. It's not helpful -- and I don't want to waste my time dealing with their code.

If people want to work long hours then fine, I've no objections to them doing that. But in my experience most people - outside of a very small number of vocational jobs such as farming or being a doctor - don't want to work long hours and have other interests in their lives that they wish to attend to.

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