The issue is in corporate jobs (including tech) Friday is a very relaxed day. If you are working a shorter week than everyone else, you end up doing the same amount of work in less time for less money.
I remember when in France, the work week went from 39 to 35, that was 35h work week paid 39 - no pay cuts.
Now I get that the economy/job market isn't like it was then, what with all the layoffs to protect shareholder from growth dropping from +9% to only +5% (arbitrary example from one company).
But I am baffled at how quickly employees seem to have internalized the idea that reduced hours require reduced pay before even getting a chance for any negotiations. With all the value that's being produced, we're just accepting that it continue to be unfairly distributed, and that workers see no benefit (or barely) from the increases in productivity.
I'm sorry, if a pay cut is required, or condensed hours are required, it's no social progress, just lip service at best to exploit people more under the guise of flexibility.
I'd prefer having fridays officially off instead of being stuck at my pc not doing much work. If I'm already not working most fridays, why is it such a big deal to just make it official, get paid the same and not have to warm a seat poitnlessly?
Until employers run out of qualified someones willing to work for less, they don’t have much long-term incentive to pay you 25% more than someone else is willing to take for the same job.
And I know only all too well employers will continue even at the point of hiring unqualified someones willing to work for less...
But I'm wondering if there is more at play. Like is the web so full of HR BS that people don't know better? Is the economy really that bad or is it a self fulfilling prophecy because corporate scare tactics work?
And don't get me started on LLMs confidently repeating the same one sided HR BS when you ask anything about work conditions, and then claiming it intends to provide a comprehensive list of unbiased potential solutions to try, conveniently leaving out the last one which should be if all else fails start sending resumes...
Anyway, I'm seeing more unions spin up and more strikes this year, so I guess that gives me a bit of hope at least.
And given a ratio of 80% spending and 20% saving, that Friday can be the difference between living paycheck-to-paycheck and early retirement.
Essentially if you make 5k a month, spend 4k and invest 1k at an 8% ROI from age 25, you'll have:
180k, 570k and 1400k at age 35, 45 and 55 respectively. If you live off of 4% of that, you'll have a passive income of $0.6k, $1.9k and $4.6k respectively at the same ages.
In other words working that relaxed Friday from age 25 and investing the proceeds, will get you to the point that you passively earn the same as you did working Monday through Thursday by age 52 or so, without working again. And that's true for any income, at those same ratios.
For many tech jobs the salaries are so high that you can feasibly get to early retirement in your 30s.
There's a lot to be said about the power of a 3-day weekend though. It's not just that you get an extra day of weekend, you also lose a day of work. Expressed as a ratio, is when it clicked for me: You go from 5:2 to 4:3, or in other words: 2.5 days of work for every 1 day of leisure -> 1.3 days of work for every 1 day of leisure. It's approximately twice as good a ratio. And you really feel it, you feel rested and refreshed.
I'm still doing 5d a week. For me the holy grail is to find a company that does 36h contracts with fulltime pay, where you have a 4 day week every other week. All the benefits of full pay, the occasional relaxed friday, but also two long weekends each month allowing trips, hobbies, projects, rest etc.
35 hour weeks used to be pretty common in a lot of businesses before the overtime rules were watered down.