I was a part-time, paid firefighter in Woodinville, WA for seven years. That was about twenty-five years ago now.

I worked twelve hour overnight shifts about ten times a month, supplementing the full-time crews (24 hour shifts.) I was a signed off as a firefighter, driver-operator, EMT Basic, and acting lieutenant.

Maybe it's different elsewhere, but in our city no one spent their time doing nothing. There was always training and drilling, classes to attend, physical training, station, rig and equipment maintenance, and usually, a few calls to run.

Most people were friendly most of the time.

We did usually watch a couple of hours of television or a movie most nights before we racked out.

Secretaries aren't an obvious case in my experience. A good number of them appear to me to work as hard as the boss they assist. And in some cases they appear pretty much as capable (but they never carry anything like the same responsibility).