Most people who have answering emails as part of their job are not working for an hourly wage. The other aspect is that some of us actually like our work and want to succeed at it: we don’t see work as slavery or some kind of adversarial relationship with the “boss.” Many people actually believe in what the company is trying to do and actually care about the job.

And the work has to get done at some point right? Most jobs that involve answering emails aren’t like factory jobs where you simply make as many widgets as possible during your shift and that’s is.

Every email I answer “on the train” means one less thing to do when actually at the office. Which means I can take a longer lunch or just relax a bit more or just have a slightly less frenetic pace.