Hacker News Reader

Comment by bartkappenburg | Hacker News Reader

I'm Dutch and I work 4 days a week. My productivity in my startup is the same. This is what researchers say about our average number of hours per week:

For example, Dutch workers are on par with American workers in terms of productivity per hour. They pay higher taxes and earn less than Americans. But on average, they work roughly 11 weeks less than their American counterparts each year, have access to government-funded health care, pay little or nothing for a college education, and have far more leisure time than the American. When UNICEF recently ranked 21 industrialized nations by well-being for children, Netherlands was on top and the United States was near the bottom, in 20th place.

View on HN

I'm a little confused by this statement:

> For example, Dutch workers are on par with American workers in terms of productivity per hour.

If it's productivity per hour, doesn't that mean that the total productivity of Americans per week (or year) would be higher? Because as you're saying it, then Americans work 40h a week, and you work 30h a week, yet Americans are able to maintain the same level of productivity per hour.

So can you clarify whether it's really same productivity per hour, or whether you meant same productivity say..per week, or month, or year. Because if it's per week, then the Dutch productivity would have to be higher per hour than the American productivity, in order to be the same "per week".

I'm not the grandparent poster but, in this context, productivity is usually defined as $/hour worked or GDP/total hours worked (so "productivity per hour" is arguably redundant).

gp is saying that:

* Netherlands' productivity ($/hour) is on par with US' * during 1 year, the Dutch work less hours per capita * so GDP/capita is lower in Netherlands * but that's OK, because Europe

American worked is cheaper too. And the energy is much cheaper than in EU. Ergo, not really competitive.

Without getting too much into it, it's always dangerous comparing different countries. I'm not trying to discredit you, but at times it can be apples and oranges because the amount of variables is incredible.

For example, consider when somebody asks, "Well, $country has light rail that's cheap, punctual, and goes everywhere. Why doesn't the U.S. have it?"

They ignore that the U.S. is the fourth largest country in the world by land area. The state of Oregon has roughly the same land area as the United Kingdom. While light rail may be something that's very good to have, it can be otherwise impractical for a country as large as the U.S.

Light rail is typically used for compact urban areas. The US has lots of compact urban areas. And some of them do have light rail.

The land area argument is often trotted out by Americans ignoring that there are many other countries with even lower population density, and ignoring that population density varies greatly by area and average population density for the US as a whole is only relevant if we're asking questions about the US as a whole.

Your overall point that it's dangerous to compare is fair enough, though.

(I'm just tired of the population density argument being trotted out, coming from Norway, with a population density well under half that of the US that's a poster child for why average population density is irrelevant - things like rail etc. works well in Norway only because the main population centres covers only a tiny portion of the land mass; and that's largely true for the US too)

I understand for urban areas. I was thinking about the country as a whole. Think of the middle of the U.S. -- huge dollar amounts spent on the infrastructure for not many people using it. But I understand your point. I'd be lying if I said I didn't support or never used light rail myself.

edit:

Is the number of hours in a day also larger in the U.S. than in most other countries in the world?

The Dutch are also the most indebted people on earth:

http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/factbook-2013-en/images/g...

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1000142405297020375260...

http://www.economist.com/blogs/charlemagne/2013/11/netherlan...

Which means that as a country the people will have to either fall into bankruptcy, dramatically cut their quality of living, or work a lot more. All that leisure time came at a very high cost.

Well... this is slightly disingenuous.

The WSJ article specifically mentions that this relates to secured debt (mortgages), not credit card debt. Interest rates are fully tax deductible in the Netherlands, which incentivizes higher mortgage debt than in many other countries. Many people own homes, and the ones that do borrow the majority of the market value when buying.

Housing prices did fall recently (and are now headed back up), but they did not tank as they did in the US. Similarly, the rules on mortgages were on the whole much stricter than in the US; this, combined with the relatively low unemployment rate, resulted in a foreclosure rate which is the lowest in Europe.

The housing market during the crisis, and to some extent now, looks a lot like people stuck in the place where they live. They can make the mortgage payments just fine, but their hopes of swapping that starter house for a larger one have been put on hold until either they build up more equity or the housing market improves.

^this; In part it's a culture thing that one buys a house when one gets married and the like, but the tax rules (deductible mortgage interest) and whatnot give people an incentive to never finish paying off their mortgages.

Another factor (IIRC) is that before the crisis, housing prices just went steadily upwards, doubling or even tripling their values during a lifetime (probably less if you take inflation into consideration). This caused a lot of people to extend their mortgage or take a second or even third mortgage on the gained value of their house, which was used to add to the house or buy a car or things like that.

First of all, household debt is household debt, it is not disingenuous, it's exactly what it sounds like. And it obviously does not only include mortgage debt.

Second, who said anything about the United States? Why is that always the knee-jerk reaction? Mortgage debt is included in the US calculation anyway, so what's the point exactly? The US doesn't get a special calculation for household debt that is different from the Netherlands. Non-the-less I wasn't comparing the two. Let's compare the Netherlands to the rest of Europe who they are in theory most similar to: their individual debt is drastically higher than basically all of Europe.

Third, having eg 100% of your home consumed by debt, means you do not own equity in your home. That's household debt, and it should count just as much as credit card debt should: you have to pay for it, it's going to come out of your future earnings one way or another, and if you do not pay for it there will be serious financial consequences. And when the number is 250%+, you can bet that is coming home to roost sooner rather than later.

My point stands: to deal with that extreme level of household debt (and that's assuming there isn't another crisis any time soon that tips a dangerous situation into an untenable situation) will require a dramatic change to how the people of the Netherlands live. Most likely part of that equation will have to be working more. My argument is that a social trade-off has been made between work, leisure and debt, and to the extent that compromise has been made, in the future it will have to be reversed.

It does by no means follow that the current level of household debt must lead to any dramatic changes.

A high household debt implies that there's relatively less money left over for domestic consumption, compared to similar countries with less debt. Low domestic consumption is a drag on employment. That means that new jobs must come from the export sector, but with the current worldwide stagnation, that does not look hopeful.

I fear another decade of very slow growth, not a sudden collapse: unemployment is stable, mortgage requirements have been fairly strict, so people who can pay their mortgage this month, can pay it the next.

For the day off does the entire company not work or do different people take different days off. My reasoning is because if you are working supporting a 24x5 or 24x7 platform then you need full time cover.

Friday is by far the most popular day to take off. Many offices are nearly empty on Friday. I'm currently alternating weekly between Fridays and Wednesdays, with my wife taking the opposite day, because we both agree Wednesday's free afternoon would be a great time to do things with our son, but it's also a day with important stuff happening at work. Before that, I had Mondays off.

Jobs that need full time cover tend to have a schedule for their employees. And when it's 24x5 or 24x7, you're going to need a schedule anyway, because a regular 40 hour work week doesn't cover that either.

Different people take different days off to ensure continuity.

I also found out that during the off day I'm processing the stuff that has happened on the job and this helps me in my focus and deciding what the next steps are. Considering this, my productivity and effectivity both went up.

I don't know of any companies that completely shut down. People take a fixed day off but it's a different day for everyone.

As you might conjecture this can lead to some friction where people only meet between Tuesday and Thursday. This leads to slight inefficiencies but in my experience these are small in well managed teams.

Most support is 8-18x5.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com