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Speaker 1: Welcome to How to Money. I'm Joel and today I'm

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Speaker 1: talking work less, Live More with Juliette Shore. So most

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Speaker 1: of us can agree that Americans are overworked and that

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Speaker 1: we tend to overspend to compensate. It's also true that

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Speaker 1: most of us we're not going to hit the Tim

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Speaker 1: Ferriss goal of working four hours a week still. John

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Speaker 1: Maynard kines the British economists. He predicted that we'd be

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Speaker 1: working fifteen hour weeks by now, but he was way off.

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Speaker 1: My guest today is here to parse the modern day

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Speaker 1: work details. She says that four day work weeks can

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Speaker 1: lighten the load, they can be realistic, and they can

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Speaker 1: allow us to live more life, which sounds nice. So

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Speaker 1: we're going to get into that. Juliette Shore is an economist.

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Speaker 1: She's a professor of sociology at Boston College, and she's

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Speaker 1: best known for her research on work consumption and economic inequality. Juliette,

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Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining me on the podcast today.

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Speaker 2: Great to be here.

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Speaker 1: First question I ask everyone who comes on. It helps

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Speaker 1: us get to know you a little bit. What do

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Speaker 1: you like to sporge on? I like to sporge on

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Speaker 1: craft beer. It can be quite expensive at times. What

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Speaker 1: is that for you? The thing where you're like people

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Speaker 1: might say I'm crazy, but I'm happily going to spend

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Speaker 1: money in this way, even while I'm trying to be

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Speaker 1: smart with my money and think about my future.

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Speaker 3: Uh, I'm so embarrassed. Please don't discount all the other

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Speaker 3: things I have to say on the pod. My kids

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Speaker 3: think this is so ridiculous. But I like expensive hotels.

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Speaker 1: Oh, okay, so you're not staying at the motel six?

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Speaker 2: Definitely not?

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Speaker 1: And are you? Are you trying to save money when

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Speaker 1: you book expensive hotels? Are you just like it doesn't

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Speaker 1: even matter. I'm staying at the place I want to stay.

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Speaker 1: I'm not been shopping around.

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Speaker 2: No, I definitely. Well.

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Speaker 3: I mean, there are a lot of really expensive ones

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Speaker 3: I won't go too. But I just I think it's

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Speaker 3: because my parents took me to them as a kid.

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Speaker 3: I just I just really like to stay in the

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Speaker 3: nicer places.

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Speaker 2: I do.

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Speaker 3: I do look for deals. I you know, I am.

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Speaker 3: I am, you know, a little bit frugal. I guess

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Speaker 3: that's not really a good word when you talk about

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Speaker 3: spending three or four hundred dollars.

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Speaker 2: I try to get value for money.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so you know, this is reminding me of I

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Speaker 1: don't know if I've ever told this story on the podcast,

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Speaker 1: but when my wife and I were getting married, I

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Speaker 1: was booking a hotel in Memphis, Sore I got married,

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Speaker 1: and there was one hotel I really wanted us to

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Speaker 1: stay at, it the Peabody, because they have they lay

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Speaker 1: out this red carpet and the ducks come walking down

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Speaker 1: and it's like this really fun experience. But if I

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Speaker 1: booked directly at the Peabody, it was gonna be like

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Speaker 1: five hundred dollars a night, and I knew on Priceline

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Speaker 1: there were three hotels it could have been if I

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Speaker 1: was making a bid, and I knew I could like

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Speaker 1: pay half of that, but there was only a thirty

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Speaker 1: percent chance really that I was going to get this

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Speaker 1: hotel that I wanted to stay at, And I remember

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Speaker 1: my mom being like, stop being cheap and just pay up.

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Speaker 1: I did the price line bid, and I like ended

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Speaker 1: up lucking out and getting the Peabody Hotel. So I

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Speaker 1: got the best of both worlds. But man, it could

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Speaker 1: have gone south. It could have gone a different way.

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Speaker 2: I'm glad, and yes, we booked the plot.

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Speaker 3: We booked the Plaza, which I'd never stayed at before.

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Speaker 3: That was amazing, Okay before before Trump owned it.

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Speaker 1: Okay, all right, So I want to get to there's

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Speaker 1: You've been writing about some of these issues of work

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Speaker 1: and how Americans spend and consume and the relationship between

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Speaker 1: those two things, and alongside other other aspects of American

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Speaker 1: life and economics as well. But I feel like that

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Speaker 1: theme of work has been running through the output your

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Speaker 1: output for decades. Why why has that interest you into

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Speaker 1: you in particular so much?

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Speaker 2: Well?

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Speaker 3: I got into it totally by chance. I was studying.

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Speaker 3: I was doing sort of labor economics, and I was

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Speaker 3: interested in what the factors that drove how hard people

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Speaker 3: would work and kind of the conflicts between employers trying

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Speaker 3: to get more work out of people and you know,

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Speaker 3: people not necessarily loving that kind of you know, having

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Speaker 3: the whip on their back as it were, and you know,

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Speaker 3: so that sort of conflicts in the labor market, and

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Speaker 3: that through a that got me looking at how working

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Speaker 3: hours affect what people do while they're on the job,

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Speaker 3: Like if they have longer working hours, are they more

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Speaker 3: tied into their jobs? Do they feel more pressure to

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Speaker 3: you know, work hard and do whatever the boss says,

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Speaker 3: Like the difference between having one forty hour a week

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Speaker 3: job where you're totally dependent on that job for your

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Speaker 3: income versus if you had two twenty hour week jobs,

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Speaker 3: were you more likely to tell your boss to, you know,

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Speaker 3: like the Dolly Parton thing, take this job and shove it.

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Speaker 3: So it was really I got into studying working hours

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Speaker 3: because I was interested in dynamics within the workplace.

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Speaker 1: Well tell me about that. Are people better off having

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Speaker 1: two twenty hour week jobs than one forty hourly job?

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Speaker 3: Well? No, but here's the thing. So my theory was

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Speaker 3: it explained why it is that if you want a

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Speaker 3: short hour job, if you want to work short hours,

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Speaker 3: you pay a huge penalty for it. Because if you

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Speaker 3: have a full time job, what I called a long

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Speaker 3: hour's job, you'll have benefits and you know, possibly a

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Speaker 3: career ladder.

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Speaker 2: And so forth.

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Speaker 3: But in order to get a job where you don't

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Speaker 3: have to work those long hours, there are massive penalties.

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Speaker 2: They're lower wages, there.

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Speaker 3: Are no benefits, there's you know, you don't have career

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Speaker 3: career pathways. And so I was really interested and sort

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Speaker 3: of how employers had structured the workplace to be you know,

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Speaker 3: full of long The good jobs were all really long

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Speaker 3: hour jobs.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I have a friend who was able to negotiate with

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Speaker 1: his employer to go down from forty hours a week

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Speaker 1: to thirty hours a week and reduce his salary by

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Speaker 1: a quarter, but he's able to keep his benefits. And

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Speaker 1: I was like that, you just struck gold there, and

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Speaker 1: I think a lot of people would kill for that,

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Speaker 1: But not many employers are willing to go there.

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Speaker 3: Right, And you know, it is getting a little more

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Speaker 3: flexible than I mean. I wrote my first book, The

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Speaker 3: Overworked American, came out in nineteen ninety two, and at

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Speaker 3: that time there was much much less kind of decent,

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Speaker 3: good part time work. But the companies I'm studying now

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Speaker 3: are giving people the thirty two hour weeks with no

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Speaker 3: reduction in pay. Yes, keep all your benefits.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: And because one of the and people are doing as

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Speaker 3: much work as they were generally speaking, that's what we're

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Speaker 3: hearing from the companies because one of the things, you

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Speaker 3: know that a lot of people who go to those

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Speaker 3: shorter schedules and take the hit on the salary say

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Speaker 3: they're doing.

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Speaker 2: As much work as they used to. Yeah, they're just

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Speaker 2: getting paid less.

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Speaker 3: And that's why you see, you know, some of the

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Speaker 3: people who go to those salaries, they go back up

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Speaker 3: because they say it's not fair. You know, I was

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Speaker 3: doing the same amount. I want to get all the money.

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Speaker 1: So I want to dig in, specifically because your most

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Speaker 1: recent book is talks a lot about for four day

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Speaker 1: work weeks, and I want to dig into that a lot.

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Speaker 1: I want to set the table down. I want to

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Speaker 1: hear maybe what trends have been like over the past decades.

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Speaker 1: Like so for a long long time, work hours declined

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Speaker 1: in the United States, around the world, and much of

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Speaker 1: the world for since like the eighteen hundreds, right, we

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Speaker 1: were just seeing people working a lot less, having more

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Speaker 1: leisure time. But it seems like there was like something

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Speaker 1: that happened right around nineteen seventy that changed that.

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Speaker 3: Yes, so beginning in eighteen seventy you begin to get

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Speaker 3: a long period of work time reduction. The US leads

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Speaker 3: the world in work time reduction. Night eighteen seventy, average

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Speaker 3: work week was three thousand hour work year. Three thousand

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Speaker 3: hours a year. That's sixty hours a week. Let me

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Speaker 3: just put a little pin in that for one second.

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Speaker 3: The thing that most people don't realize is in the

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Speaker 3: century before. So from seventeen seventy to eighteen seventy, working

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Speaker 3: hours went up a lot. So the early period of

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Speaker 3: the industrialization, which you know, the first factories came in

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Speaker 3: seventeen seventy ish.

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Speaker 2: Around that, you.

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Speaker 3: Get a long period where people are working longer and

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Speaker 3: longer hours, more and more days per year, and kind

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Speaker 3: of really getting squeezed. And it gets to the point.

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Speaker 1: Where those kids are working too, you know.

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Speaker 3: Exactly the kids in the factories working sixteen hour days

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Speaker 3: and they're barely getting any money, and they're dying of

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Speaker 3: malnutrition and overwork. So you know, you get unions, you

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Speaker 3: get society, you know, do gooters, people start mobilizing to

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Speaker 3: do something about it. You get that long period of

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Speaker 3: worktime reduction. I began looking, but I noticed that it

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Speaker 3: seemed like things were stopping, that was stopping in the

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Speaker 3: United States, and I began looking at trends and hours

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Speaker 3: of work, and what you see is beginning around as

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Speaker 3: you say, right about nineteen seventy, we start an upward

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Speaker 3: creep of hours. And my first book on this went

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Speaker 3: to the end of the eighties, so twenty years, and

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Speaker 3: there there was about an average of one hundred and

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Speaker 3: sixty four hours of what I call the extra month

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Speaker 3: of work, so four forty hour weeks on average people

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Speaker 3: putting in paid work. And a lot of that was

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Speaker 3: women working more of the year and longer hours, you know,

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Speaker 3: going from sort of women as mothers, particularly part time

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Speaker 3: workers to full time workers. But then you know, hours

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Speaker 3: kept going up, and we've had about a three hundred

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Speaker 3: hours a year increase since I first started looking at

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Speaker 3: this data, and that puts us squarely in opposition to

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Speaker 3: all the other countries that we were moving with before. Germany, France,

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Speaker 3: the UK, you know, all these other countries continued on

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Speaker 3: that path.

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Speaker 2: Of warktime reduction.

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Speaker 3: When I wrote The Overworked American, Japan was the workaholic

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Speaker 3: country among the wealthier countries. Americans now work, on average

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Speaker 3: more than Japanese do.

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Speaker 1: What about the pandemic? How did that shift the balance

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Speaker 1: of power and the amount of time people spend working,

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Speaker 1: Because it's certainly, at least for a hot minute, employees

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Speaker 1: had more leverage than employers.

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Speaker 2: Totally.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it didn't.

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Speaker 3: Last well, I think it lasted a little longer than

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Speaker 3: people think, and in some ways I think, I mean,

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Speaker 3: right now, it's a sort of questionable period in the

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Speaker 3: labor market. You have certain certain kinds of jobs where

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Speaker 3: they're just you know, tech is really suffering. But the

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Speaker 3: pandemic changed everything in the labor market in many ways,

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Speaker 3: and it's what kicked off this four day.

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Speaker 2: Week movement that I've been studying. But what happened was.

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Speaker 3: People's sense of the economic concept that I developed with

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Speaker 3: my advisor. We call it the cost of job loss,

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Speaker 3: or basically the value of a job to a worker

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Speaker 3: compared to their next best alternative. And that's really key

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Speaker 3: and we use that to study all kinds of things.

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Speaker 3: It turns out it's really key in wages, it's key

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Speaker 3: and how much workers go on strike. I mean, you've

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Speaker 3: had a lot of strikes in the last couple of

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Speaker 3: years because that the value of the job changed, and

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Speaker 3: it's key to central bank policy and upon I mean,

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Speaker 3: I studied a whole range of things. So what happened

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Speaker 3: was that the value of the job really felt during

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Speaker 3: the pandemic. Why two things. One is everyone was so

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Speaker 3: stressed out and work was stressing people out and so

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Speaker 3: it had much more negatives with it. And number two,

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Speaker 3: the government was giving people money so people could afford

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Speaker 3: to quit their jobs because they had bank accounts that

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Speaker 3: were way higher than the typical thing for Americans. You

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Speaker 3: had that period, I mean, I think most of it

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Speaker 3: it's gone now, but that period where people had money

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Speaker 3: in their bank accounts versus the sixty percent or whatever

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Speaker 3: it is who were living paycheck to paycheck. So that

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Speaker 3: was that's what was really key in the Great Resignation.

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Speaker 3: A lot of those were low wage workers, you know,

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Speaker 3: who don't typically have big bank accounts and who just

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Speaker 3: like they couldn't take it anymore, or just way too

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Speaker 3: much stress because there was the pandemic level stress and

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Speaker 3: then the stress in the workplace, and the two of

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Speaker 3: those together. American workers were already quite stressed out before

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Speaker 3: the pandemic. Pandemic just put a lot of people over

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Speaker 3: the edge.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, what would you say to someone who says, well,

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Speaker 1: look at the economy differences between a country like the

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Speaker 1: United States and a country like France, right, and hey, yeah,

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Speaker 1: they get plenty of time off at shorter work weeks,

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Speaker 1: but the economic dynamism dynamism of America is unmatched. So

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Speaker 1: there are pros and cons to this. Maybe workaholism or

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Speaker 1: lack thereof.

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Speaker 3: Okay, so there are a couple different things. I mean,

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Speaker 3: you mentioned dynamism, economic dynamism. It may be matched by

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Speaker 3: China at this point, but fair enough. I mean, I

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Speaker 3: think a lot of the European countries, you know, they

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Speaker 3: do tend to be a little bit less they tend

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Speaker 3: to be a little bit less dynamic, but their productivity

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Speaker 3: is really high. And so if you take Germany as

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Speaker 3: like the lowest hours of any of these countries, they

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Speaker 3: have tremendously high labor productivity, which is what allows them

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Speaker 3: to fund those hours, and people have really good standards

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Speaker 3: of living. In the US, we have economic dynamism, but

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Speaker 3: the vast majority of it is going of that wealth

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Speaker 3: is going to a very small number of people. And

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Speaker 3: you just have a lot of people are being i mean,

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Speaker 3: for one of a better word, exploited in the labor market.

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Speaker 3: You know, they're just hardly getting any money, they're being

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Speaker 3: treated poorly, etc. You just in Europe, workers have a

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Speaker 3: lot more protections, they have a lot more free time,

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Speaker 3: you know, shorter working hours, vacations, income security. You're much

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Speaker 3: much better off being an average person from an economic

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Speaker 3: point of view. In those countries, you may be less

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Speaker 3: likely to get rich. But think about it. I mean,

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Speaker 3: how many billionaires really are there that you know? Hardly

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Speaker 3: any of us are going to get that?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you and I aren't there, Julian, I don't see

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Speaker 1: it coming in time soon down the pike either. If

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Speaker 1: given the choice, though, like just talking from a normal

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Speaker 1: American perspective, regular income earner, do you think people want

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Speaker 1: more free time or do you think people want more stuff?

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Speaker 1: And do you think that people are kind of making

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Speaker 1: an informed choice in that regard or that the cultural

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Speaker 1: tides have kind of overwhelmed us and we don't have

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Speaker 1: much of a choice to make. We're kind of forced

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Speaker 1: in like a square peg going into a round hole

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Speaker 1: if we try to take more time off.

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Speaker 2: So I addressed this in the Overworked American book.

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Speaker 3: Now that book came out in ninety two, but basically

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Speaker 3: what I argued there is, if you if you look

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Speaker 3: at people's you ask them about their preferences.

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Speaker 2: What would you rather have more time? You know your

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Speaker 2: you can get a raise.

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Speaker 3: Or you can get more time off next year percent raise,

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Speaker 3: two percent, time off whatever. People will say they want

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Speaker 3: the time off at that time pretty strongly so, but

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Speaker 3: the companies weren't giving them the time off, they're giving

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Speaker 3: them more money, and if you ask them a year later,

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Speaker 3: they don't want to go back to what they were

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Speaker 3: a year before.

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Speaker 1: Yep, they might say they want Well, that's because they

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Speaker 1: already bought the new car and they've got that hefty

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Speaker 1: car pay that they got to exactly.

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Speaker 3: So people get locked into whatever level of spending they have,

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Speaker 3: either through debt or just getting habituated to. You know,

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Speaker 3: I said at the beginning of the podcast, I like

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Speaker 3: nice hotels, but that's you know, I've crept up there

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Speaker 3: right like I never it used to be.

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Speaker 2: I would go to.

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Speaker 3: A you know, like maybe one hundred dollars a night hotel,

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Speaker 3: and then at two hundred we get we acclimate as

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Speaker 3: we get nicer and nicer stuff, we just kind of get,

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Speaker 3: you know, used to it.

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Speaker 2: And you know, whether.

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Speaker 3: It's you mentioned a car or the size of your

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Speaker 3: house or any of those things. You know, our sort

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Speaker 3: of needs upscale over time with our incomes. And my book,

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Speaker 3: my book The Overspent American, had a lot about that.

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Speaker 3: Now I think today it's somewhat different. And also it

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Speaker 3: really differs across the labor market. So if you get

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Speaker 3: lower wage workers, they desperately need the money, so gonna

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Speaker 3: they're gonna take money over time. There are a lot

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Speaker 3: of higher wage earning people who are going to take

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Speaker 3: time over money, but they can't get it because they're

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Speaker 3: in their jobs. They just have to work those long

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Speaker 3: hours or they can't succeed in their jobs. And then

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Speaker 3: I think in the middle you sort of alluded to

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Speaker 3: the people in the middle. It kind of depends on

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Speaker 3: who they are and also how much debt they have

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Speaker 3: and what they're what their situation is.

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Speaker 2: But you know, I've done.

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Speaker 3: Polling over the years asking people, and this is where

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Speaker 3: the four day week come in, because I think it's

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Speaker 3: different than asking which are like a three percent increase

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Speaker 3: in free time or a three percent increase in in

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Speaker 3: your income.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of tough for us to visualize mentally, whereas

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Speaker 1: like do you want Fridays off exactly?

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Speaker 3: The whole day off is huge. It is huge, and

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Speaker 3: it is a big increase in your income.

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Speaker 2: Right, Your hourterly wage.

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Speaker 3: Goes up a lot, right, even if your total income doesn't.

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Speaker 1: Do you think just staying on kind of maybe some

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Speaker 1: of the high level stuff for just a second, do

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Speaker 1: you do you think that the world benefits from people

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Speaker 1: who work too much. I just think, like, I don't

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Speaker 1: want to work eighty hours a week. But like the

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Speaker 1: Elon Musk types, who you know, polarizing figure these days,

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Speaker 1: but who he sleeps on the office floor, gets right

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Speaker 1: back to it. There is something about the ability for

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Speaker 1: there's even you see this trend taking back up in

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Speaker 1: Silicon Valley of startups being like, we're working six days,

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Speaker 1: twelve hour days, and this is how we're going to

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Speaker 1: beat somebody else to the punch, launch our product first,

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Speaker 1: be the most successful, get the venture capital dollars, and like,

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Speaker 1: I don't want any part of that way of life.

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Speaker 1: But aren't you kind of sort of glad that some

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Speaker 1: of those people exist.

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Speaker 3: Well, there might be a few, but if you know

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Speaker 3: taking it, you say you want the high level, so

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Speaker 3: you take the big thing. I mean, Elon Musk was

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Speaker 3: making tons of mistakes. It's a big part of why

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Speaker 3: he had to be there at the factory, and his

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Speaker 3: people were hating on him, and you know, he kind

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Speaker 3: of had to be there because everything was, you know,

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Speaker 3: maybe falling apart. It was a nightmare, Okay, His sleeping

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Speaker 3: at the factory was a nightmare. In the same way

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Speaker 3: that his doge was a nightmare and so forth, Well,

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Speaker 3: let's leave him aside. What we have a lot of

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Speaker 3: startups in our research who are going to four day weeks.

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Speaker 3: And I'll give you an example of someone who contacted

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Speaker 3: us recently. He's the founder of an He's a company

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Speaker 3: which does agentic AI. So they're building an AI humans

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Speaker 3: in the loop decision making tool. It's a pretty cool project,

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Speaker 3: you know product. And he realized that he he scheduled.

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Speaker 3: He wanted to talk to me about the four day week.

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Speaker 3: And between the time we talked and when we had

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Speaker 3: our you know, we first commute, had our meeting, he said,

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Speaker 3: I just pulled the trigger.

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Speaker 2: They're all on. I put everybody on a four day week. Now.

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Speaker 3: Why the work was too mentally taxing and use the

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Speaker 3: word emotionally exhausting. And this is one of the things

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Speaker 3: about really creative work. I mean, you do sometimes have

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Speaker 3: these people who go crazy and they just it's all

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Speaker 3: they can think about, and it's you know, it's a

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Speaker 3: sort of type. But I think for the bassmin I

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Speaker 3: think that's a really small number of people. For most

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Speaker 3: of us, our we make fewer mistakes, we're more creative,

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Speaker 3: we have better overall output, you know, production or you know,

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Speaker 3: what we do is better if we give our time,

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Speaker 3: our brain's time to rest. And you know, there's a

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Speaker 3: big literature on this now. One of the guys I

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Speaker 3: work with, Alex Pang on four day week stuff, wrote

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Speaker 3: a book called Rest, which is about a lot of

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Speaker 3: that literature and how if we're not resting our brains

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Speaker 3: and giving our self that like mental time where nothing's happened,

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Speaker 3: we're way less creative.

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Speaker 2: And I know, so I don't think.

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Speaker 3: I think workaholic culture leads to a lot of problems.

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Speaker 2: You know, in Japan they call it death by overwork.

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Speaker 1: I mean you have that too, yeah, yeah, And just

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Speaker 1: people that get so discouraged and despairing about how big

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Speaker 1: of a role work is playing in their lives that

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Speaker 1: sometimes they can't think of any way else to proceed

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Speaker 1: but to end their lives. And it's so it's so sad.

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Speaker 1: It's devastating to see that trend.

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Speaker 3: Like, I'm not advocating being a slacker. You know, I have,

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Speaker 3: I've like written six solo books. I have, you know,

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Speaker 3: probably six more that I've done with other people.

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Speaker 2: I have.

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Speaker 1: You're not saying drinking lemonade all day.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, but I also understand that you have to have

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Speaker 3: a balance in life, first of all, if you want

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Speaker 3: to have a good life, but also if you want

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Speaker 3: to do good work. I mean, many writers will tell

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Speaker 3: you this, and I you know, when I write my books,

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Speaker 3: get up in the morning and do your work, and

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Speaker 3: you know, after about five or six hours, your brain

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Speaker 3: is fried.

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Speaker 1: I think I love it. Let's I think that's a

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Speaker 1: great way to really kick off this conversation and start

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Speaker 1: talking about four day work weeks, how important they can be,

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Speaker 1: and how we might implement those, how to make them

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Speaker 1: kind of normal. We'll get to more on that with

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Speaker 1: Juliet Shore right after this. Okay, we're back. I want

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Speaker 1: to talk about four day work weeks with Professor Juliet Shore,

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Speaker 1: who has written so much about that intersection of work

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Speaker 1: and consumption. And I guess I do just want to

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Speaker 1: one more big level question. There's a conundrument. It seems

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Speaker 1: like between the reality that free markets and people choosing

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Speaker 1: to work as much as they want to if they

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Speaker 1: start a business, like truly, if I start a bakery

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Speaker 1: and I'm open two extra hours, like I might be

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Speaker 1: able to track more customers build up a business in

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Speaker 1: a way that somebody was saying, I'm not going to

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Speaker 1: work on Saturday is when most of my clients would

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Speaker 1: come in to buy, would be able to succeed, but

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Speaker 1: also that can impact negatively impact human flourishing. How do

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Speaker 1: you thread that needle? It does feel like there's a

440
00:23:18,840 --> 00:23:23,480
Speaker 1: needle that needs to be threaded right, and it's not

441
00:23:23,480 --> 00:23:24,200
Speaker 1: an easy one.

442
00:23:24,640 --> 00:23:25,000
Speaker 2: Yeah.

443
00:23:25,080 --> 00:23:27,920
Speaker 3: Well, that's a great point because one of the things

444
00:23:27,920 --> 00:23:30,960
Speaker 3: we see in the research we're doing, and just to

445
00:23:32,040 --> 00:23:33,600
Speaker 3: know I can go into more depth on it. But

446
00:23:33,720 --> 00:23:37,160
Speaker 3: basically what's been going on with my team, my research

447
00:23:37,200 --> 00:23:40,760
Speaker 3: team is since twenty twenty two, we've been tracking companies

448
00:23:40,800 --> 00:23:43,480
Speaker 3: around the world. We have there are about almost four

449
00:23:43,520 --> 00:23:46,720
Speaker 3: hundred companies now in our database or about to come

450
00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:52,040
Speaker 3: into our database who have instituted four day work weeks

451
00:23:52,040 --> 00:23:54,600
Speaker 3: with no reduction in pay. And these are thirty two

452
00:23:54,600 --> 00:23:55,320
Speaker 3: hour work weeks.

453
00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:59,840
Speaker 2: These are not compressed but ten howadays exactly, they're eight hour.

454
00:24:00,400 --> 00:24:03,080
Speaker 3: Many of them do have clients. Some of them are

455
00:24:03,119 --> 00:24:06,720
Speaker 3: twenty four to seven operations, but many of them are

456
00:24:06,760 --> 00:24:10,760
Speaker 3: like nine to five and they are not gonna Many

457
00:24:10,800 --> 00:24:13,479
Speaker 3: do close on Monday, but many don't. And it depends

458
00:24:13,480 --> 00:24:16,400
Speaker 3: on the nature of their business. And so if you're

459
00:24:16,440 --> 00:24:21,919
Speaker 3: a bakery, you need to be open on Saturdays. Maybe

460
00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:25,280
Speaker 3: closing on Sundays is fine because your competitors all close

461
00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:27,680
Speaker 3: on Sunday, or maybe you don't, but.

462
00:24:27,880 --> 00:24:30,119
Speaker 2: They figure out how to make it work.

463
00:24:30,480 --> 00:24:33,400
Speaker 3: You know, they'll It's like there's so much shift work

464
00:24:33,440 --> 00:24:36,439
Speaker 3: in our economy anyway, and you know there's so many

465
00:24:36,640 --> 00:24:40,400
Speaker 3: companies that are not on nine to five Monday through Friday.

466
00:24:40,520 --> 00:24:44,959
Speaker 3: They've figured out how to stay open and still you know,

467
00:24:45,000 --> 00:24:47,840
Speaker 3: their employees can have a four day week. So it

468
00:24:47,920 --> 00:24:53,680
Speaker 3: a lot is how that it depends and the fact

469
00:24:53,760 --> 00:24:57,280
Speaker 3: that you stay open doesn't automatically get you more customers.

470
00:24:57,320 --> 00:24:58,920
Speaker 2: And so one of the things.

471
00:25:00,440 --> 00:25:02,280
Speaker 3: You know that you have to think about is what

472
00:25:02,359 --> 00:25:05,399
Speaker 3: is the relationship between your operating hours and your customers.

473
00:25:06,040 --> 00:25:10,000
Speaker 3: But a couple of the one of the industries where

474
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:11,520
Speaker 3: we're seeing a lot of the four day week is

475
00:25:11,520 --> 00:25:15,000
Speaker 3: in sort of marketing and pr and one of the

476
00:25:15,040 --> 00:25:17,960
Speaker 3: things that some of the companies tell us is they're

477
00:25:18,040 --> 00:25:21,760
Speaker 3: able to sell more business to their existing customers when

478
00:25:21,800 --> 00:25:23,560
Speaker 3: they go to the four day week because they have

479
00:25:23,560 --> 00:25:26,200
Speaker 3: a lot more stability in their teams. Their people come

480
00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:29,040
Speaker 3: up with better ideas, they know the client's better, so

481
00:25:29,080 --> 00:25:31,280
Speaker 3: they're spending less of their time just out there trying

482
00:25:31,320 --> 00:25:32,320
Speaker 3: to find new customers.

483
00:25:32,320 --> 00:25:34,200
Speaker 2: So that's a kind of interesting wrinkle on it.

484
00:25:34,800 --> 00:25:38,880
Speaker 1: Why is the four day work week the solution? And

485
00:25:39,280 --> 00:25:42,399
Speaker 1: if that's a great solution, why not go down to three?

486
00:25:42,520 --> 00:25:45,240
Speaker 1: Why not even too? Like? Why why does the four

487
00:25:45,320 --> 00:25:47,800
Speaker 1: day work We kind of feel like this silver bullet

488
00:25:47,800 --> 00:25:48,000
Speaker 1: to you.

489
00:25:48,280 --> 00:25:52,000
Speaker 3: Well, in part it's because we're at five, so I

490
00:25:52,040 --> 00:25:55,800
Speaker 3: think five to three is too big. What we're seeing

491
00:25:56,000 --> 00:25:59,720
Speaker 3: is that five to four companies can manage it with

492
00:26:01,000 --> 00:26:04,320
Speaker 3: many of them will say without any loss in productivity.

493
00:26:04,600 --> 00:26:09,000
Speaker 1: So what's going on actually additional eight hours that people

494
00:26:09,040 --> 00:26:12,359
Speaker 1: are cutting out of their work schedules. How are we

495
00:26:12,520 --> 00:26:15,800
Speaker 1: just as productive working so many fewer hours in a

496
00:26:15,800 --> 00:26:17,960
Speaker 1: week from a percentage standpoint?

497
00:26:18,119 --> 00:26:21,960
Speaker 3: So the most common thing is that there are there's

498
00:26:22,000 --> 00:26:26,560
Speaker 3: a lot of wasted time in meetings. So many of

499
00:26:26,560 --> 00:26:30,200
Speaker 3: these we have mostly white collar companies in our database.

500
00:26:30,240 --> 00:26:33,720
Speaker 3: I mean we also have a small manufacturing or restaurant, healthcare,

501
00:26:33,760 --> 00:26:36,800
Speaker 3: and we have all kinds of things, but the vast

502
00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:40,560
Speaker 3: bulk are white collar, and so they have excessive meetings.

503
00:26:40,720 --> 00:26:44,399
Speaker 3: Why because the workweek was kind of stuck at five.

504
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,320
Speaker 3: A lot of labor saving technology, all this digital technology

505
00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:50,080
Speaker 3: which makes many things faster to.

506
00:26:50,080 --> 00:26:53,840
Speaker 2: Do, came in. And then what did they do with

507
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:54,680
Speaker 2: the extra time?

508
00:26:54,800 --> 00:26:58,480
Speaker 3: They just expanded meetings and email overload and you know

509
00:26:58,560 --> 00:27:02,639
Speaker 3: that sort of thing. So meetings are like the number

510
00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:04,920
Speaker 3: one thing that they look at. Number two they look

511
00:27:05,080 --> 00:27:09,159
Speaker 3: at distractions, and meetings are a distraction, but there are

512
00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:13,159
Speaker 3: many other kinds of distractions, and they create focus time,

513
00:27:13,680 --> 00:27:16,440
Speaker 3: and so people actually put their heads down and get

514
00:27:16,480 --> 00:27:20,600
Speaker 3: their work done much more efficiently than they did, you know,

515
00:27:20,720 --> 00:27:21,960
Speaker 3: pre four day week.

516
00:27:22,200 --> 00:27:24,760
Speaker 1: Because they don't have time to scroll anymore. They got

517
00:27:24,800 --> 00:27:26,480
Speaker 1: to get their stuff done. If they're going to work,

518
00:27:26,720 --> 00:27:28,440
Speaker 1: get it all done in four days exactly.

519
00:27:28,520 --> 00:27:30,639
Speaker 2: And you know, we hit others.

520
00:27:30,880 --> 00:27:32,639
Speaker 3: Well, there are lots of other things people do, Like

521
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:35,600
Speaker 3: we have a brewery in our sample, and I talk

522
00:27:35,640 --> 00:27:38,080
Speaker 3: about these a lot of these cases in more depth

523
00:27:38,280 --> 00:27:40,720
Speaker 3: in the book. But in the brewery they did time

524
00:27:40,760 --> 00:27:43,160
Speaker 3: and motion studies for every one of their.

525
00:27:44,560 --> 00:27:45,040
Speaker 2: Steps.

526
00:27:45,400 --> 00:27:47,720
Speaker 3: Brewing has a lot of different steps, a lot of

527
00:27:47,760 --> 00:27:52,639
Speaker 3: cleaning the machinery and so forth. It turned out they

528
00:27:52,640 --> 00:27:55,120
Speaker 3: were allotting way more time for some of these things

529
00:27:55,160 --> 00:27:58,160
Speaker 3: than they needed. They learned to how to slot one

530
00:27:58,240 --> 00:28:01,679
Speaker 3: step into the kind of the time and another step

531
00:28:01,720 --> 00:28:05,200
Speaker 3: and you know, like bring certain things forward to make

532
00:28:05,240 --> 00:28:09,120
Speaker 3: them get done. You know, so they change the sequencing.

533
00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:14,280
Speaker 3: One manufacturing company changed who was doing what. They figured out, Okay,

534
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:17,120
Speaker 3: this guy is really efficient at this task. Why don't

535
00:28:17,119 --> 00:28:19,359
Speaker 3: we just have him do that most of the time

536
00:28:19,520 --> 00:28:20,480
Speaker 3: and let other people.

537
00:28:21,040 --> 00:28:24,840
Speaker 1: So some of them goes through more specialization all the forms.

538
00:28:24,400 --> 00:28:27,440
Speaker 3: That they use and figure out like, okay, this form

539
00:28:27,520 --> 00:28:29,320
Speaker 3: takes so long to fill out, do we really need

540
00:28:29,359 --> 00:28:33,240
Speaker 3: all this information? Or they they sort of look at

541
00:28:33,280 --> 00:28:38,240
Speaker 3: everything they're doing. Another big thing is documentation. We have

542
00:28:38,320 --> 00:28:41,840
Speaker 3: a lot of tech firms that do customer service and

543
00:28:42,320 --> 00:28:46,080
Speaker 3: if you're not like really documenting everything your customer service

544
00:28:46,120 --> 00:28:49,800
Speaker 3: people are trying to they're reinventing the wheel on a lot.

545
00:28:49,680 --> 00:28:50,480
Speaker 2: Of these calls.

546
00:28:50,680 --> 00:28:54,520
Speaker 3: But not all the companies do documentation because it's kind

547
00:28:54,520 --> 00:28:56,880
Speaker 3: of people don't like to do it. It's a lot

548
00:28:56,880 --> 00:28:59,880
Speaker 3: of upfront work so that they find all sorts of

549
00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:01,720
Speaker 3: ways to save time.

550
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:04,440
Speaker 1: And you've called it, well like a like a forcing function,

551
00:29:04,840 --> 00:29:07,880
Speaker 1: like when you implement the four day workweek, it it

552
00:29:07,960 --> 00:29:10,120
Speaker 1: kind of forces people to get it done. It's like,

553
00:29:10,120 --> 00:29:13,560
Speaker 1: you've got to figure it out now. And ultimately they're

554
00:29:13,600 --> 00:29:16,160
Speaker 1: happy to have had that forcing function because of what

555
00:29:16,200 --> 00:29:17,840
Speaker 1: it allows them in their private life.

556
00:29:17,880 --> 00:29:22,200
Speaker 3: Totally, yes, And the forcing function, it's so interesting. You know,

557
00:29:22,240 --> 00:29:26,280
Speaker 3: my training is in economics. In economics, the theory is

558
00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:29,240
Speaker 3: that the market is the forcing function and that firms

559
00:29:29,280 --> 00:29:32,800
Speaker 3: who don't get as efficient as possible drop out. But

560
00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:35,120
Speaker 3: in the real world, that's in the real world, that's

561
00:29:35,160 --> 00:29:39,240
Speaker 3: not actually how it works. And you know, if for

562
00:29:39,400 --> 00:29:41,880
Speaker 3: economists who just you know, don't just think about the

563
00:29:41,920 --> 00:29:44,960
Speaker 3: models but actually look at data, you see that in

564
00:29:45,040 --> 00:29:48,760
Speaker 3: every industry there's a big range of levels of productivity

565
00:29:48,760 --> 00:29:52,280
Speaker 3: and efficiency, even in the same making the same products.

566
00:29:53,280 --> 00:29:55,760
Speaker 3: And so, you know, I asked a lot of these

567
00:29:55,760 --> 00:29:59,680
Speaker 3: companies because this idea. But there's this you know, it's

568
00:29:59,800 --> 00:30:02,480
Speaker 3: you know, we call it like a free lunch like that.

569
00:30:02,760 --> 00:30:06,040
Speaker 3: There's efficiency gains to be had there that you're not

570
00:30:06,160 --> 00:30:07,280
Speaker 3: taking advantage of.

571
00:30:07,320 --> 00:30:08,920
Speaker 2: And I say, well, why did you need a four

572
00:30:09,000 --> 00:30:12,760
Speaker 2: day week to do this? Because you could have changed

573
00:30:12,760 --> 00:30:15,840
Speaker 2: your meeting culture. Without a four day week, you could

574
00:30:15,840 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 2: have given people, you know, distray. People hate meetings.

575
00:30:18,720 --> 00:30:20,920
Speaker 3: They wouldn't have minded that or you could have given them,

576
00:30:21,120 --> 00:30:23,680
Speaker 3: you know, focused time without a four day week.

577
00:30:24,360 --> 00:30:26,240
Speaker 2: And there are two things.

578
00:30:26,280 --> 00:30:28,400
Speaker 3: I mean, I think one is there is a little

579
00:30:28,400 --> 00:30:31,240
Speaker 3: bit of you are asking people to kind of, you know,

580
00:30:31,560 --> 00:30:34,680
Speaker 3: be a bit more intense about the work. And although

581
00:30:35,160 --> 00:30:38,120
Speaker 3: we find very small increases in the pace of work

582
00:30:38,160 --> 00:30:39,480
Speaker 3: and the intensity of work.

583
00:30:39,680 --> 00:30:42,280
Speaker 2: But the other thing.

584
00:30:42,200 --> 00:30:44,840
Speaker 3: Is they were just like we just we were just

585
00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:47,360
Speaker 3: trying to survive, you know, we're like trying to keep

586
00:30:47,360 --> 00:30:50,920
Speaker 3: our heads above what. I remember asking one woman at

587
00:30:50,960 --> 00:30:55,200
Speaker 3: a tech firm, you know, I called it a functional company,

588
00:30:55,240 --> 00:30:58,560
Speaker 3: the one that you know didn't have any inefficiency, said

589
00:30:58,600 --> 00:31:01,920
Speaker 3: why why didn't you achieve that level of you know,

590
00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:03,080
Speaker 3: as a functional company?

591
00:31:03,120 --> 00:31:07,160
Speaker 2: And she said, have you ever seen a functional company?

592
00:31:09,880 --> 00:31:11,640
Speaker 1: No? I love that, And I think you're right. I mean,

593
00:31:11,640 --> 00:31:14,719
Speaker 1: I think it's a really important insight that most people

594
00:31:15,240 --> 00:31:16,880
Speaker 1: they're not going to take a hard look unless they're

595
00:31:16,880 --> 00:31:19,520
Speaker 1: forced to. And this is the perfect way to force

596
00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:22,120
Speaker 1: yourself to take a hard look at your processes. And

597
00:31:22,320 --> 00:31:25,280
Speaker 1: at the same time, what are the biggest benefits that

598
00:31:25,360 --> 00:31:30,680
Speaker 1: employees give for having a four day work week, Like

599
00:31:30,760 --> 00:31:34,320
Speaker 1: what did they experience when they have a three day weekend?

600
00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:38,680
Speaker 1: Every weekend? And work takes up less of their overall time.

601
00:31:39,320 --> 00:31:41,600
Speaker 3: So a bunch of different ways to answer that question.

602
00:31:41,720 --> 00:31:45,520
Speaker 3: We have twenty different metrics that we well being metrics

603
00:31:45,600 --> 00:31:51,000
Speaker 3: that we collect and if you look at the things

604
00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:53,880
Speaker 3: that are driving the increases and well being, because some

605
00:31:53,920 --> 00:31:59,800
Speaker 3: of the metrics affect other well being, you know, measures

606
00:32:00,720 --> 00:32:05,360
Speaker 3: people are less tired, so fatigue is really key. Sleep

607
00:32:05,520 --> 00:32:08,720
Speaker 3: is really key. People sleep more and the fewer sleep problems,

608
00:32:08,760 --> 00:32:09,800
Speaker 3: and they exercise more.

609
00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:10,560
Speaker 2: So that's the.

610
00:32:10,520 --> 00:32:13,840
Speaker 3: Sort of outside of work stuff that happens. And then

611
00:32:14,160 --> 00:32:17,160
Speaker 3: within work there's something else really interesting.

612
00:32:18,440 --> 00:32:19,320
Speaker 2: We have their.

613
00:32:19,600 --> 00:32:23,560
Speaker 3: Self reports of their productivity, so we ask them rate

614
00:32:23,640 --> 00:32:27,440
Speaker 3: your current ability at work compared to your lifetime best,

615
00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:29,840
Speaker 3: like or how good a worker are you compared to

616
00:32:29,840 --> 00:32:33,680
Speaker 3: your lifetime best And that goes way up before the

617
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:37,120
Speaker 3: trial starts to six months later and then twelve months later,

618
00:32:37,840 --> 00:32:40,600
Speaker 3: and people just feel so much more on top of

619
00:32:40,640 --> 00:32:45,360
Speaker 3: their work and that really improves their well being. And

620
00:32:45,400 --> 00:32:50,800
Speaker 3: that's something happening in work because they can recover. The

621
00:32:50,880 --> 00:32:53,800
Speaker 3: time off allows them to recover. They feel refreshed and

622
00:32:53,880 --> 00:32:56,160
Speaker 3: ready to go back to work. Many more eager to

623
00:32:56,200 --> 00:32:59,840
Speaker 3: get back to work. They don't feel like their work

624
00:33:00,120 --> 00:33:02,080
Speaker 3: week is impossible.

625
00:33:01,560 --> 00:33:04,360
Speaker 1: Mondays, don't, you know, in a negative way anymore.

626
00:33:04,000 --> 00:33:07,480
Speaker 3: Monday stone hit. You know, you don't have the Sunday scaries,

627
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:09,520
Speaker 3: you don't have the hump day as it's called on

628
00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 3: the Wednesday. It just I remember one woman I interviewed

629
00:33:12,760 --> 00:33:15,520
Speaker 3: because we also do like in depth interviews, and she said,

630
00:33:16,160 --> 00:33:18,440
Speaker 3: I used to be so anxious at the beginning of

631
00:33:18,480 --> 00:33:19,800
Speaker 3: the week that I wasn't going to be able to

632
00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:23,200
Speaker 3: get my work done. And she said, that's totally done.

633
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:26,880
Speaker 3: Now It's like people just figure out how to power

634
00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:29,200
Speaker 3: through their workloads much better.

635
00:33:29,320 --> 00:33:33,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, So what do you think the tools are for

636
00:33:33,200 --> 00:33:38,600
Speaker 1: getting more companies to adopt a four day work week,

637
00:33:39,360 --> 00:33:43,560
Speaker 1: where you know, and for CEOs, for managers to sign

638
00:33:43,600 --> 00:33:46,160
Speaker 1: off on this, and for and what does it take,

639
00:33:46,200 --> 00:33:50,840
Speaker 1: like look like for employees to petition their boss? Is

640
00:33:50,880 --> 00:33:52,920
Speaker 1: this is this something that is a top down thing

641
00:33:53,240 --> 00:33:56,320
Speaker 1: or should individuals be coming to their manager and saying, listen,

642
00:33:56,520 --> 00:33:58,360
Speaker 1: I don't know if you're going to do this company wide,

643
00:33:58,560 --> 00:34:01,320
Speaker 1: but this is something that this is something I've heard

644
00:34:01,320 --> 00:34:03,320
Speaker 1: about and I'm interested in, and I think I can

645
00:34:03,360 --> 00:34:05,840
Speaker 1: get just as much done. Like, what is it like

646
00:34:05,840 --> 00:34:07,280
Speaker 1: from implementation perspective?

647
00:34:07,560 --> 00:34:10,640
Speaker 3: One thing that's important that we're finding is these are companies.

648
00:34:10,920 --> 00:34:13,520
Speaker 3: Most of them are small and medium size, but you know,

649
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:16,400
Speaker 3: we have some really big ones, but mostly small and medium.

650
00:34:16,719 --> 00:34:20,360
Speaker 3: They're doing it as a whole company, and that's really

651
00:34:20,360 --> 00:34:24,040
Speaker 3: good because it's if it's just a few individuals doing it,

652
00:34:24,040 --> 00:34:26,480
Speaker 3: they're going to get the stigma of being thought like

653
00:34:26,840 --> 00:34:31,040
Speaker 3: not as committed workers and so forth. So they're doing

654
00:34:31,120 --> 00:34:31,760
Speaker 3: it all together.

655
00:34:31,960 --> 00:34:32,480
Speaker 2: It is.

656
00:34:32,840 --> 00:34:37,359
Speaker 3: The companies in our research are pretty much it's all

657
00:34:37,400 --> 00:34:40,560
Speaker 3: top down. So it's like that guy I mentioned earlier,

658
00:34:40,640 --> 00:34:44,359
Speaker 3: like a CEO, a founder, a president, whatever, or maybe

659
00:34:44,360 --> 00:34:47,080
Speaker 3: ahead of HR who just thinks, I think this is

660
00:34:47,120 --> 00:34:49,200
Speaker 3: going to work for our company, let's try it, and

661
00:34:49,239 --> 00:34:52,360
Speaker 3: they all the whole model is like a six month trial,

662
00:34:52,480 --> 00:34:55,440
Speaker 3: so they're not like committing to something before they know

663
00:34:55,520 --> 00:34:57,720
Speaker 3: that it can work for them.

664
00:34:58,680 --> 00:34:58,880
Speaker 2: You know.

665
00:34:58,960 --> 00:35:02,080
Speaker 3: So I wrote my book in part for people to

666
00:35:02,160 --> 00:35:05,759
Speaker 3: read it and either just ordinary employees who could then

667
00:35:06,080 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 3: take it take the information to their seniors, managers and

668
00:35:10,120 --> 00:35:13,400
Speaker 3: so forth, but also the you know, the CEOs, the founders,

669
00:35:13,520 --> 00:35:17,800
Speaker 3: the presidents, whatever. So there's a lot of data research

670
00:35:17,920 --> 00:35:20,080
Speaker 3: there to try and convince people. But you know, I

671
00:35:20,120 --> 00:35:24,040
Speaker 3: think the most effective convincers are the companies that have

672
00:35:24,160 --> 00:35:24,560
Speaker 3: done it.

673
00:35:24,600 --> 00:35:26,960
Speaker 2: And I just you know, a.

674
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:29,399
Speaker 3: Couple of days ago, I was in New York doing

675
00:35:29,480 --> 00:35:34,600
Speaker 3: a session with two different One is the CEO of

676
00:35:34,640 --> 00:35:37,200
Speaker 3: a marketing company and the other is the head of

677
00:35:37,320 --> 00:35:42,000
Speaker 3: nursing at a big hospital area actually at a cancer

678
00:35:42,080 --> 00:35:46,799
Speaker 3: center that's part of a hospital, big hospital, and they

679
00:35:46,840 --> 00:35:51,960
Speaker 3: gave the nurse nurse managers a four day week. I mean,

680
00:35:52,480 --> 00:35:56,480
Speaker 3: these are like really high pressure jobs. And I have

681
00:35:56,600 --> 00:36:00,920
Speaker 3: discussion of this case and also managers nurses that are

682
00:36:00,920 --> 00:36:02,080
Speaker 3: in our research too.

683
00:36:03,080 --> 00:36:04,760
Speaker 2: And the other is marketing.

684
00:36:04,520 --> 00:36:08,319
Speaker 3: And you know, just I think when people hear it

685
00:36:08,480 --> 00:36:13,840
Speaker 3: from the companies that have succeeded with it, it's that's the

686
00:36:13,880 --> 00:36:17,440
Speaker 3: most powerful way. So a lot of companies are out

687
00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:19,480
Speaker 3: there talking about their experiences.

688
00:36:19,840 --> 00:36:22,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, and probably one of the biggest hurdles is like

689
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:26,319
Speaker 1: a cultural attachment to work and maybe like an inherited

690
00:36:26,360 --> 00:36:29,800
Speaker 1: Puritan work ethic or something like that, where it seems

691
00:36:30,040 --> 00:36:34,760
Speaker 1: almost like and you mentioned this earlier, like I'm not lazy,

692
00:36:34,800 --> 00:36:39,640
Speaker 1: I'm writing books, like I'm not encouraging just chilling and

693
00:36:39,719 --> 00:36:42,920
Speaker 1: not doing something meaningful. But is that one of the

694
00:36:42,960 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 1: biggest pushbacks you get, Like what are we from employers

695
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:49,200
Speaker 1: saying like, oh my gosh, this is gonna result in

696
00:36:49,200 --> 00:36:52,320
Speaker 1: widespread laziness. How can we how can we work less?

697
00:36:52,760 --> 00:36:57,000
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, I mean there is that there is that group.

698
00:36:57,080 --> 00:36:58,360
Speaker 3: I think they tend to be at some of the

699
00:36:58,400 --> 00:37:01,879
Speaker 3: bigger firms that were like, well, work more and so forth.

700
00:37:01,960 --> 00:37:06,160
Speaker 3: But I think a lot of management are understanding how

701
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:08,400
Speaker 3: stressed out their workers are and how it's just not

702
00:37:08,520 --> 00:37:09,120
Speaker 3: good for them.

703
00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:09,640
Speaker 2: Now.

704
00:37:09,680 --> 00:37:12,880
Speaker 3: One of the things that that led many of the

705
00:37:12,960 --> 00:37:20,680
Speaker 3: companies into our research what is resignations. So, like the

706
00:37:20,760 --> 00:37:24,120
Speaker 3: marketing company that I just mentioned, they just had a

707
00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:28,239
Speaker 3: slew of resignations. I mean they're Canadian. It was not

708
00:37:28,360 --> 00:37:32,160
Speaker 3: part of the US Great resignation, but Canada was experiencing

709
00:37:32,200 --> 00:37:33,360
Speaker 3: something similar.

710
00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:34,640
Speaker 2: The very first.

711
00:37:34,440 --> 00:37:38,680
Speaker 3: Company that signed up for these in this research had

712
00:37:38,680 --> 00:37:40,439
Speaker 3: the same thing. They had a whole bunch of people

713
00:37:40,560 --> 00:37:43,319
Speaker 3: leave and they're like, we got to do something. And

714
00:37:43,760 --> 00:37:47,440
Speaker 3: so I think that most of in these most of

715
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:51,680
Speaker 3: these companies, people understand how much stress and burn out

716
00:37:51,719 --> 00:37:57,200
Speaker 3: their employees are experiencing and that they can help them.

717
00:37:57,840 --> 00:38:00,560
Speaker 3: There's really high turnover in some kinds of jobs in

718
00:38:00,600 --> 00:38:04,600
Speaker 3: the US in these marketing firms. You know, there apparently

719
00:38:04,640 --> 00:38:08,040
Speaker 3: it's like a thirty percent turnover, and then you're spending

720
00:38:08,280 --> 00:38:12,359
Speaker 3: enormous amounts of money and time replacing people and then

721
00:38:12,480 --> 00:38:14,600
Speaker 3: training them, and then they leave.

722
00:38:14,880 --> 00:38:17,640
Speaker 1: And that is one of the one of the most

723
00:38:17,719 --> 00:38:21,239
Speaker 1: underconsidered costs of running a company is employee turnover. And

724
00:38:21,719 --> 00:38:24,160
Speaker 1: so if you pay people poorly and treat them poorly,

725
00:38:24,400 --> 00:38:26,520
Speaker 1: they leave quickly, and then you have to find someone

726
00:38:26,560 --> 00:38:29,279
Speaker 1: else to replace them, and that training period can be

727
00:38:29,440 --> 00:38:32,160
Speaker 1: so long and costly, like you've just tripped over your

728
00:38:32,200 --> 00:38:32,560
Speaker 1: own feet.

729
00:38:32,719 --> 00:38:33,240
Speaker 2: So true.

730
00:38:33,600 --> 00:38:36,320
Speaker 3: So one of the marketing executives that I actually opened

731
00:38:36,320 --> 00:38:39,320
Speaker 3: the book with her and she's a really visionary person,

732
00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:44,440
Speaker 3: and she just said she ended up putting it into

733
00:38:44,560 --> 00:38:47,719
Speaker 3: her contracts with her clients that she would have a

734
00:38:48,040 --> 00:38:50,920
Speaker 3: like a one percent turnover. The clients couldn't believe it

735
00:38:51,080 --> 00:38:54,759
Speaker 3: because there's so much turnover in that business, and that

736
00:38:54,960 --> 00:38:58,920
Speaker 3: she would get a bonus if she made that turnover figure.

737
00:38:59,000 --> 00:39:02,479
Speaker 3: But she had a fifty person team and nobody left

738
00:39:02,520 --> 00:39:03,280
Speaker 3: that team.

739
00:39:03,440 --> 00:39:05,560
Speaker 2: Wow, after we got the four day week.

740
00:39:05,960 --> 00:39:08,400
Speaker 1: One of the other hurdles that strikes me is just

741
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:13,200
Speaker 1: that the desire that people have to inflate their lifestyles

742
00:39:13,239 --> 00:39:16,760
Speaker 1: to buy more things to buy, nicer things to stay

743
00:39:17,080 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 1: a nicer hotel, rooms, to have own, nicer cars, whatever

744
00:39:21,040 --> 00:39:25,279
Speaker 1: it is, bigger houses, It means working longer hours much

745
00:39:25,280 --> 00:39:27,719
Speaker 1: of the time. Like that is, It's like if I

746
00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:30,040
Speaker 1: work more, I can get paid more, and it means

747
00:39:30,040 --> 00:39:33,759
Speaker 1: I can live the lifestyle I want. Do you think

748
00:39:33,800 --> 00:39:36,440
Speaker 1: that our desire to keep up with the Joneses is

749
00:39:36,560 --> 00:39:39,600
Speaker 1: part of this working too much problem that we have

750
00:39:39,680 --> 00:39:40,320
Speaker 1: in this country?

751
00:39:41,000 --> 00:39:43,839
Speaker 3: That's certainly there for some people, But for a lot

752
00:39:43,880 --> 00:39:47,720
Speaker 3: of people, their jobs dictate how many hours they work,

753
00:39:48,000 --> 00:39:50,440
Speaker 3: and a lot of people, you can put in more hours,

754
00:39:50,520 --> 00:39:52,279
Speaker 3: you won't necessarily get paid more.

755
00:39:52,360 --> 00:39:54,840
Speaker 2: We have so many people on salary in this country.

756
00:39:54,880 --> 00:39:57,319
Speaker 3: I mean, and if you're talking about someone who's they

757
00:39:57,320 --> 00:39:59,040
Speaker 3: want to fancy your car, they want a bigger house,

758
00:39:59,040 --> 00:39:59,439
Speaker 3: et cetera.

759
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:01,640
Speaker 2: Chances there on a salary.

760
00:40:01,800 --> 00:40:05,000
Speaker 3: So you might you might be working really hard to

761
00:40:05,080 --> 00:40:09,600
Speaker 3: try and get that promotion. That's possible, But that's a

762
00:40:09,680 --> 00:40:13,640
Speaker 3: kind of an iffy thing. I mean, what you know,

763
00:40:13,760 --> 00:40:17,120
Speaker 3: part of what we're looking at are companies that are

764
00:40:17,160 --> 00:40:21,080
Speaker 3: realizing the person who's there all the time isn't necessarily

765
00:40:21,120 --> 00:40:24,560
Speaker 3: the most efficient person, right, So what is that relationship

766
00:40:24,560 --> 00:40:25,760
Speaker 3: between how many hours.

767
00:40:25,520 --> 00:40:27,279
Speaker 2: Somebody works, on how good they are, and they're for

768
00:40:27,440 --> 00:40:28,120
Speaker 2: what they deserve.

769
00:40:28,160 --> 00:40:31,960
Speaker 3: I mean, yes, companies want people who are committed, for sure,

770
00:40:32,080 --> 00:40:35,839
Speaker 3: they don't they're not going to promote slackers. But it's

771
00:40:35,920 --> 00:40:38,640
Speaker 3: you know, if you're the last As I remember a

772
00:40:38,680 --> 00:40:43,640
Speaker 3: famous reporter told me, journalism is notoriously long hour profession.

773
00:40:44,080 --> 00:40:46,880
Speaker 2: She said, we have the last man's standing.

774
00:40:46,760 --> 00:40:53,200
Speaker 3: Culture here, like everybody was afraid to leave the newsroom.

775
00:40:54,960 --> 00:40:58,879
Speaker 3: And it's just it's dysfunctional. I mean, my colleagues who

776
00:40:58,880 --> 00:41:01,920
Speaker 3: I work with, and the really the consultants in this world,

777
00:41:01,960 --> 00:41:03,960
Speaker 3: they call it. You know what do they call it?

778
00:41:04,000 --> 00:41:08,880
Speaker 3: Productivity theater where people just pretend to be productive?

779
00:41:09,280 --> 00:41:12,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, which is crazy. Yeah, And if you care about

780
00:41:12,960 --> 00:41:15,799
Speaker 1: your business, like you care about uncovering that so that

781
00:41:15,840 --> 00:41:18,960
Speaker 1: your workers are happier and that you're actually productive and

782
00:41:19,040 --> 00:41:22,640
Speaker 1: not just like feigning productivity, it makes me think of

783
00:41:22,760 --> 00:41:26,200
Speaker 1: just at a job, there's also this like underlying message

784
00:41:26,200 --> 00:41:28,359
Speaker 1: that we get from any of our employers that we

785
00:41:28,400 --> 00:41:31,000
Speaker 1: had this. We used to have these meetings once a

786
00:41:31,080 --> 00:41:33,919
Speaker 1: month and people would get hundred dollars for doing things

787
00:41:33,960 --> 00:41:36,600
Speaker 1: that were above and beyond, and it always involved coming

788
00:41:36,640 --> 00:41:40,680
Speaker 1: in at five am because something was on fire, and like, hey,

789
00:41:41,040 --> 00:41:44,600
Speaker 1: Joe skipped his kid's soccer game on Saturday to do work.

790
00:41:44,640 --> 00:41:46,440
Speaker 1: And I was like, man, I hope I never win

791
00:41:46,480 --> 00:41:48,600
Speaker 1: this hundred bucks, Like not because I don't care about

792
00:41:48,600 --> 00:41:51,319
Speaker 1: my job, not because I don't care about putting out

793
00:41:51,360 --> 00:41:54,879
Speaker 1: good work, but because I'm not abandoning my soccer game

794
00:41:55,239 --> 00:41:56,920
Speaker 1: to try to come in and put out a fire,

795
00:41:57,040 --> 00:41:58,799
Speaker 1: Like I'm just not. I don't want to do that.

796
00:41:58,840 --> 00:42:01,040
Speaker 1: And I think there are those tout all messages too,

797
00:42:01,040 --> 00:42:03,440
Speaker 1: that get sent from a lot of employers where like

798
00:42:03,960 --> 00:42:06,279
Speaker 1: this is this is your life. You know that, right.

799
00:42:06,440 --> 00:42:08,319
Speaker 1: The other part of your life is fine, but this

800
00:42:08,440 --> 00:42:10,759
Speaker 1: job is actually your life. And I think that's kind

801
00:42:10,760 --> 00:42:12,239
Speaker 1: of insidious too, works its way in.

802
00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:16,320
Speaker 3: We had a case before I was doing these trials,

803
00:42:16,360 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 3: studying these companies, I did a lot of work on

804
00:42:18,719 --> 00:42:21,920
Speaker 3: gig laborers and like you know, uber drivers and stuff.

805
00:42:21,960 --> 00:42:22,239
Speaker 2: And we.

806
00:42:23,680 --> 00:42:27,000
Speaker 3: Remember a case of a delivery driver that we interviewed

807
00:42:27,600 --> 00:42:29,720
Speaker 3: and he was I think he was on a scooter

808
00:42:29,880 --> 00:42:31,839
Speaker 3: or something. He was hit by a car. He was

809
00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:36,640
Speaker 3: badly injured, and instead of going to the hospital, he

810
00:42:36,800 --> 00:42:39,440
Speaker 3: finished the delivery. Oh you know, he should have just

811
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:42,719
Speaker 3: gone right to the hospital, and the company put it

812
00:42:42,760 --> 00:42:45,920
Speaker 3: out on their Facebook page and they gave him one

813
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:49,200
Speaker 3: hundred dollars and it was like wow, like it wasn't

814
00:42:49,200 --> 00:42:52,839
Speaker 3: this great and it was so horrible because this poor

815
00:42:52,920 --> 00:42:54,759
Speaker 3: guy needed to get to the hospital.

816
00:42:55,160 --> 00:42:57,640
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great example. We got a few more

817
00:42:57,719 --> 00:43:00,000
Speaker 1: questions I want to get to with you, Julia, including

818
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:03,279
Speaker 1: kind of how you navigate consumption and ways that we

819
00:43:03,320 --> 00:43:06,640
Speaker 1: can consume more intelligently. Get to a few more questions

820
00:43:06,640 --> 00:43:16,080
Speaker 1: with you right after this. All right, we're back still

821
00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:18,600
Speaker 1: talking with Juliette. Sure. We're talking about working less and

822
00:43:18,680 --> 00:43:22,400
Speaker 1: living more. And Juliet you wrote a book called True Wealth,

823
00:43:22,680 --> 00:43:26,200
Speaker 1: and in that book you at least partially talk about

824
00:43:26,680 --> 00:43:29,920
Speaker 1: like new consumer habits around like sharing that can lead

825
00:43:29,920 --> 00:43:32,399
Speaker 1: to less buying and more swapping. I think you called

826
00:43:32,400 --> 00:43:36,719
Speaker 1: it connected consumption, and I really like that term. Do

827
00:43:36,760 --> 00:43:38,319
Speaker 1: you think is that one of those things too that

828
00:43:38,360 --> 00:43:42,120
Speaker 1: can help people own less, work less, and live more

829
00:43:42,200 --> 00:43:43,920
Speaker 1: of the life They want to think even think about

830
00:43:43,920 --> 00:43:45,600
Speaker 1: like self driving cars and I'm like, does this mean

831
00:43:45,680 --> 00:43:47,640
Speaker 1: I don't have to own a car someday? That maybe

832
00:43:47,640 --> 00:43:51,600
Speaker 1: this technological progress And sometimes it's not even technological progress.

833
00:43:51,600 --> 00:43:54,239
Speaker 1: It's just a website that connects people. That means that

834
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:57,279
Speaker 1: we don't have to buy the stuff ourselves, can save

835
00:43:57,360 --> 00:43:59,239
Speaker 1: more of our money, and then maybe it means we

836
00:43:59,239 --> 00:44:00,640
Speaker 1: don't have to work as much much as we thought.

837
00:44:01,320 --> 00:44:06,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, I mean I co founded an organization many

838
00:44:06,280 --> 00:44:10,080
Speaker 3: years ago with a woman named Vicky Robin, who you

839
00:44:10,120 --> 00:44:14,120
Speaker 3: may know from the Financial independence movement, I mean, one

840
00:44:14,160 --> 00:44:19,080
Speaker 3: of the founders of that financial With Joe Domingu's they

841
00:44:19,080 --> 00:44:21,879
Speaker 3: wrote that book Your Money or Your Life, and that

842
00:44:22,120 --> 00:44:25,080
Speaker 3: really was all about saying, you need to think about

843
00:44:25,080 --> 00:44:27,920
Speaker 3: the relationship between what you spend and how much you

844
00:44:27,960 --> 00:44:30,759
Speaker 3: have to work, and so whenever you buy something, think

845
00:44:30,800 --> 00:44:32,880
Speaker 3: about the number of hours that you have to work

846
00:44:33,040 --> 00:44:35,439
Speaker 3: to earn the money to buy. That so very much

847
00:44:35,520 --> 00:44:38,640
Speaker 3: in mind, and so when I wrote True Wealth, it

848
00:44:38,760 --> 00:44:42,160
Speaker 3: was about like a vision for how people can dealing

849
00:44:42,280 --> 00:44:44,839
Speaker 3: from long hour jobs that they would prefer not to

850
00:44:44,840 --> 00:44:50,359
Speaker 3: be in and have lower spending requirements so they could

851
00:44:50,360 --> 00:44:54,000
Speaker 3: afford to have more freedom in terms of their work life.

852
00:44:54,120 --> 00:44:57,560
Speaker 3: So maybe it's about shifting to a more satisfying job

853
00:44:57,600 --> 00:44:59,600
Speaker 3: that pays less and how you can still have a

854
00:45:00,120 --> 00:45:02,360
Speaker 3: satisfying and good consumer life.

855
00:45:02,600 --> 00:45:04,640
Speaker 2: You know that you're not going to have to be,

856
00:45:05,680 --> 00:45:08,799
Speaker 2: you know, living in poverty in order to have a

857
00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:09,520
Speaker 2: good life.

858
00:45:09,640 --> 00:45:14,320
Speaker 3: So many different things, I mean, less new, more long

859
00:45:14,360 --> 00:45:19,080
Speaker 3: lived products, more swapping. At the time I wrote that

860
00:45:19,160 --> 00:45:22,600
Speaker 3: the Internet, like the sites were really just coming up

861
00:45:22,640 --> 00:45:27,120
Speaker 3: where you could like get free things or swap or

862
00:45:27,360 --> 00:45:30,319
Speaker 3: buy use things. I mean, there's so much that you

863
00:45:30,360 --> 00:45:34,480
Speaker 3: can get now at a vastly reduced price. I have

864
00:45:34,520 --> 00:45:38,000
Speaker 3: students who've studied these buy nothing sites. I mean these

865
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:41,280
Speaker 3: are huge sites where people just give away all kinds

866
00:45:41,280 --> 00:45:44,560
Speaker 3: of you know, really nice and valuable things that they

867
00:45:44,600 --> 00:45:46,080
Speaker 3: know longer want.

868
00:45:47,280 --> 00:45:49,120
Speaker 2: So there is and then what.

869
00:45:52,000 --> 00:45:54,000
Speaker 3: Was you know, kind of a trend at the time

870
00:45:54,400 --> 00:45:57,320
Speaker 3: that book I wrote after the crash, the two thousand

871
00:45:57,320 --> 00:46:00,919
Speaker 3: and eight crash, So you know, people growing their own

872
00:46:01,000 --> 00:46:05,120
Speaker 3: vegetables or learning how to make and do things for themselves,

873
00:46:05,600 --> 00:46:09,480
Speaker 3: which for many people is also really satisfying hobbies and

874
00:46:09,520 --> 00:46:13,760
Speaker 3: so forth, but also can reduce your need to spend income.

875
00:46:13,800 --> 00:46:15,399
Speaker 2: So I think there are lots of.

876
00:46:15,360 --> 00:46:19,600
Speaker 3: Ways that people can do that, but one of the

877
00:46:19,680 --> 00:46:23,799
Speaker 3: key things about them is you need time, because if

878
00:46:23,880 --> 00:46:27,120
Speaker 3: you have a really long hour job, you end up

879
00:46:27,160 --> 00:46:31,080
Speaker 3: not having the time to garden or to do this

880
00:46:31,200 --> 00:46:34,400
Speaker 3: or that diy or to search, you know, search for

881
00:46:34,440 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 3: that less expensive but just as good alternative that might

882
00:46:38,560 --> 00:46:42,000
Speaker 3: take you, you know, an hour or two on the internet.

883
00:46:41,600 --> 00:46:43,200
Speaker 2: Reading reviews and this and that.

884
00:46:43,320 --> 00:46:46,320
Speaker 3: Like when you don't have time, you just buy something

885
00:46:46,440 --> 00:46:49,759
Speaker 3: and you're you know, you'll pay more because you don't

886
00:46:49,800 --> 00:46:51,120
Speaker 3: have the time to figure.

887
00:46:50,800 --> 00:46:51,680
Speaker 2: Out how to be less.

888
00:46:51,680 --> 00:46:54,680
Speaker 1: So you talk in that book is one of the

889
00:46:54,719 --> 00:46:56,920
Speaker 1: things that fascinating me too. You talk about navigating the

890
00:46:57,280 --> 00:47:00,120
Speaker 1: post growth world that we live in, and you talk

891
00:47:00,120 --> 00:47:02,000
Speaker 1: about it come from a macro in from a micro

892
00:47:02,520 --> 00:47:05,719
Speaker 1: economic lens. I'm curious to hear what you mean by

893
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:08,520
Speaker 1: living in a post growth era and then like, what's

894
00:47:08,560 --> 00:47:13,560
Speaker 1: the impact that that creates and how should individuals react

895
00:47:13,760 --> 00:47:19,520
Speaker 1: if we're living in a time of like decelerating growth,

896
00:47:19,560 --> 00:47:21,719
Speaker 1: which is going to impact standard of living? Sorry, that's

897
00:47:21,760 --> 00:47:22,320
Speaker 1: a big question.

898
00:47:23,160 --> 00:47:24,839
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, but it's a really important one.

899
00:47:24,920 --> 00:47:28,919
Speaker 3: Let's put aside population growth, okay, because that, yeah, your

900
00:47:28,920 --> 00:47:31,160
Speaker 3: economy you know, usually will need to grow if you

901
00:47:31,200 --> 00:47:34,000
Speaker 3: have more people, but just for any given amount and

902
00:47:34,400 --> 00:47:36,880
Speaker 3: sort of what about the idea that you just have

903
00:47:37,000 --> 00:47:40,040
Speaker 3: the same amount of money over the next ten years

904
00:47:40,160 --> 00:47:40,560
Speaker 3: or something.

905
00:47:40,600 --> 00:47:41,680
Speaker 2: I think for most of us.

906
00:47:41,719 --> 00:47:45,279
Speaker 3: That's kind of like we are expecting that we're going

907
00:47:45,320 --> 00:47:48,040
Speaker 3: to get more money over time, but let's say we

908
00:47:48,080 --> 00:47:51,960
Speaker 3: don't pretend there's no inflation, so we're just kind of

909
00:47:52,040 --> 00:47:53,719
Speaker 3: leveled out at a certain.

910
00:47:53,480 --> 00:47:55,160
Speaker 2: Amount of money.

911
00:47:56,880 --> 00:48:00,400
Speaker 3: I think what, you know, what we have to figure

912
00:48:00,440 --> 00:48:02,440
Speaker 3: out in that cas is like if you want to

913
00:48:02,440 --> 00:48:06,960
Speaker 3: buy new things, you've got to then divest from other

914
00:48:07,360 --> 00:48:11,040
Speaker 3: you know, like if you're spending all your income, but

915
00:48:11,160 --> 00:48:14,200
Speaker 3: yet you get a new desire, like, well, what are

916
00:48:14,200 --> 00:48:16,560
Speaker 3: you going to spend less on if you're just if

917
00:48:16,560 --> 00:48:23,120
Speaker 3: you're flatlined. And one thing that I think really helps,

918
00:48:23,680 --> 00:48:28,360
Speaker 3: I mean that I've seen as I've grown older, is

919
00:48:28,440 --> 00:48:31,080
Speaker 3: the desire to acquire new things tends to be a

920
00:48:31,120 --> 00:48:34,960
Speaker 3: lot stronger when you're younger, and when you get older,

921
00:48:35,840 --> 00:48:39,160
Speaker 3: for one thing, you have more desire to divest. And

922
00:48:40,520 --> 00:48:43,799
Speaker 3: it's also I mean maybe because you've done it. I mean,

923
00:48:43,840 --> 00:48:47,360
Speaker 3: I just don't have the same desire to consume that

924
00:48:47,480 --> 00:48:49,800
Speaker 3: I used to. You know, I wrote The Overspent American.

925
00:48:49,920 --> 00:48:52,800
Speaker 3: My husband said, oh, you wrote a book about yourself.

926
00:48:53,680 --> 00:48:56,840
Speaker 3: I mean, that wasn't exactly true, but it was true

927
00:48:56,880 --> 00:48:59,040
Speaker 3: that at the time I wrote that I was much

928
00:48:59,080 --> 00:49:02,759
Speaker 3: more interested in consuming than I am today. I went

929
00:49:02,800 --> 00:49:05,799
Speaker 3: to shops more I did, you know, like now I

930
00:49:05,840 --> 00:49:09,360
Speaker 3: hardly ever go I just don't. I don't shop nearly

931
00:49:09,400 --> 00:49:11,080
Speaker 3: as much as I used to. I used to shop

932
00:49:11,120 --> 00:49:13,320
Speaker 3: a lot, and I do think I mean, there's the

933
00:49:13,360 --> 00:49:16,200
Speaker 3: whole question of, you know what, what's missing in your

934
00:49:16,239 --> 00:49:18,759
Speaker 3: life if you're like spending so much time at the mall.

935
00:49:18,800 --> 00:49:22,799
Speaker 3: There is something there's something to be said for that perspective.

936
00:49:22,880 --> 00:49:29,000
Speaker 3: But I think post growth can work, but it's sort

937
00:49:29,000 --> 00:49:34,160
Speaker 3: of it's not about you know, doing with less and

938
00:49:34,239 --> 00:49:36,640
Speaker 3: less and less. I don't think that's viable for people.

939
00:49:36,760 --> 00:49:41,600
Speaker 3: I think you get to a certain level and we're

940
00:49:41,680 --> 00:49:44,839
Speaker 3: you know, just like it's enough and you just live

941
00:49:44,880 --> 00:49:47,680
Speaker 3: with enough. Of course, you're going to change what you're consuming.

942
00:49:47,800 --> 00:49:49,919
Speaker 3: You're not always going to want to consume the same thing.

943
00:49:50,200 --> 00:49:52,640
Speaker 3: But the idea that every year we have to consume more,

944
00:49:52,880 --> 00:49:55,400
Speaker 3: I just think that's a you know, that's a problem

945
00:49:55,480 --> 00:49:59,400
Speaker 3: in a world where the ecological footprint and our carbon

946
00:49:59,440 --> 00:50:01,640
Speaker 3: footprint is destroying the planet.

947
00:50:01,680 --> 00:50:03,799
Speaker 2: We got we gotta deal with that.

948
00:50:04,040 --> 00:50:07,239
Speaker 1: Yeah, what would you say? Last question? Like, what would

949
00:50:07,280 --> 00:50:10,640
Speaker 1: you say to people out there listening who say I

950
00:50:10,960 --> 00:50:13,439
Speaker 1: like the mantra, I want to work less. I want

951
00:50:13,440 --> 00:50:15,520
Speaker 1: to live more life. I want more time for hobbies.

952
00:50:15,600 --> 00:50:18,480
Speaker 1: I don't even want fancier stuff.

953
00:50:18,600 --> 00:50:19,120
Speaker 2: I just do.

954
00:50:19,239 --> 00:50:20,960
Speaker 1: I would love to have time to garden, and I

955
00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:22,560
Speaker 1: don't feel like I have it right now. And a

956
00:50:22,560 --> 00:50:25,479
Speaker 1: big part of the reason is because work accludes too

957
00:50:25,560 --> 00:50:29,600
Speaker 1: much of my overall, like life efforts.

958
00:50:30,080 --> 00:50:33,279
Speaker 3: Yeah, how should they proceed? Well, I think they You know,

959
00:50:33,719 --> 00:50:35,960
Speaker 3: first thing is, there is this movement for a four

960
00:50:36,040 --> 00:50:40,040
Speaker 3: day week. It's gaining traction, it's gaining credibility because you

961
00:50:40,120 --> 00:50:43,400
Speaker 3: have all these experiences of companies who've done it successfully,

962
00:50:43,440 --> 00:50:45,520
Speaker 3: and you have lots of you know, data and research.

963
00:50:45,640 --> 00:50:48,920
Speaker 3: Now I'd say, first thing, see if you can work

964
00:50:48,920 --> 00:50:52,120
Speaker 3: that out in your own company, and if you can't,

965
00:50:52,800 --> 00:50:54,880
Speaker 3: see if you can find a four day week company.

966
00:50:54,880 --> 00:50:59,360
Speaker 3: Because these people who work in them, they've like dined

967
00:50:59,360 --> 00:51:03,200
Speaker 3: and gone to Honestly, they are you know, it's like

968
00:51:03,320 --> 00:51:07,920
Speaker 3: it's not just life is better, it's transformative.

969
00:51:08,000 --> 00:51:09,239
Speaker 2: It's life changing.

970
00:51:09,360 --> 00:51:12,120
Speaker 3: We've got like fifteen percent of people say I would

971
00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:14,319
Speaker 3: never go back to a five day a week job

972
00:51:14,400 --> 00:51:16,439
Speaker 3: for any amount of money. We ask them how much

973
00:51:16,520 --> 00:51:19,239
Speaker 3: money they would have, more money they'd have to earn

974
00:51:19,320 --> 00:51:21,120
Speaker 3: to go back to a five day week job, and

975
00:51:21,160 --> 00:51:24,000
Speaker 3: you've got that. I think it's fourteen percent over thousands

976
00:51:24,000 --> 00:51:27,160
Speaker 3: of workers who are saying no amount of money will

977
00:51:27,239 --> 00:51:28,160
Speaker 3: ever get me back.

978
00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,040
Speaker 1: Wow, not even like double the pay. It's like I'm

979
00:51:31,040 --> 00:51:34,400
Speaker 1: not doing it, not doing it, Julian, this has been

980
00:51:34,400 --> 00:51:36,680
Speaker 1: such a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining me.

981
00:51:37,080 --> 00:51:39,880
Speaker 1: Where can how do money listeners find out more about

982
00:51:39,920 --> 00:51:42,440
Speaker 1: you and your new book Four Days a Week?

983
00:51:43,200 --> 00:51:44,960
Speaker 2: Well, just google me or the book.

984
00:51:45,320 --> 00:51:47,880
Speaker 3: I'm most active on LinkedIn, which is the place that

985
00:51:48,040 --> 00:51:52,960
Speaker 3: has I would say the most vibrant conversation about working

986
00:51:53,000 --> 00:51:56,600
Speaker 3: hours in the four day week, but the books available everywhere.

987
00:51:57,920 --> 00:52:01,160
Speaker 3: Harper Business twenty twenty five. Four Days a Week.

988
00:52:01,440 --> 00:52:05,520
Speaker 1: Wonderful. Thank you so much, Thank you. I love talking

989
00:52:05,560 --> 00:52:08,960
Speaker 1: to personal finance creators on this podcast, but I also

990
00:52:09,640 --> 00:52:14,960
Speaker 1: really like talking to economists as well, and somebody like

991
00:52:15,040 --> 00:52:17,680
Speaker 1: Professor Juliet Shore, who has just put in many decades

992
00:52:18,920 --> 00:52:22,600
Speaker 1: of not only like personal experience into something like the

993
00:52:22,600 --> 00:52:27,000
Speaker 1: four day work week, but just so much data into

994
00:52:27,120 --> 00:52:31,120
Speaker 1: how she has seen companies implement it, the impact it's

995
00:52:31,160 --> 00:52:35,640
Speaker 1: had on the company itself, on individual employees at that company,

996
00:52:35,960 --> 00:52:39,800
Speaker 1: the way that those companies are able to retain those employees.

997
00:52:39,840 --> 00:52:43,359
Speaker 1: Like I just I really do think that this is

998
00:52:44,040 --> 00:52:48,920
Speaker 1: the future for a lot of companies, and I like

999
00:52:49,000 --> 00:52:52,080
Speaker 1: that idea, Like I really hope it succeeds, And I

1000
00:52:52,120 --> 00:52:54,439
Speaker 1: hope that if you're out there listening right now, maybe

1001
00:52:54,440 --> 00:52:57,359
Speaker 1: you're even able to advocate for this, if you work

1002
00:52:57,360 --> 00:52:59,480
Speaker 1: at a small enough company and you're able to, like

1003
00:52:59,760 --> 00:53:01,839
Speaker 1: ben the ear of your boss and say, hey, listen

1004
00:53:01,840 --> 00:53:04,920
Speaker 1: to this episode, what do you think of this? Instead

1005
00:53:04,920 --> 00:53:06,920
Speaker 1: of getting like super preaching and demanding it, maybe you

1006
00:53:06,960 --> 00:53:10,600
Speaker 1: can just kind of subtly influence the culture where you're

1007
00:53:10,640 --> 00:53:13,359
Speaker 1: working in order to benefit you and everyone else around you.

1008
00:53:13,520 --> 00:53:16,759
Speaker 1: And the truth is, we didn't refer to this, but

1009
00:53:17,480 --> 00:53:22,200
Speaker 1: Parkinson's law is at work here. And Parkinson's law is

1010
00:53:22,560 --> 00:53:27,840
Speaker 1: essentially where work expands to fill the time we have available.

1011
00:53:28,320 --> 00:53:31,799
Speaker 1: And we as humans, if we are scheduled to work

1012
00:53:31,840 --> 00:53:33,960
Speaker 1: forty hours a week, we'll find a way we'll get

1013
00:53:33,960 --> 00:53:35,920
Speaker 1: our work done in forty. If it goes down to

1014
00:53:35,960 --> 00:53:38,160
Speaker 1: thirty two, we will find a way to get it

1015
00:53:38,160 --> 00:53:40,799
Speaker 1: done in thirty two. And Matt and I found this

1016
00:53:40,920 --> 00:53:45,080
Speaker 1: out from personal experience, like when we have guests. I

1017
00:53:45,080 --> 00:53:47,440
Speaker 1: don't know, this was maybe three years ago that we

1018
00:53:47,520 --> 00:53:51,680
Speaker 1: went from working five days a week down to four

1019
00:53:52,239 --> 00:53:55,840
Speaker 1: and taking Fridays off, and just the mental clarity and

1020
00:53:55,880 --> 00:53:59,520
Speaker 1: specifically by big takeaway what Juliet mentioned was people were

1021
00:53:59,560 --> 00:54:02,040
Speaker 1: less high, they got more sleep, and they got more exercised,

1022
00:54:02,040 --> 00:54:03,880
Speaker 1: and they also said they were better at work, they

1023
00:54:03,960 --> 00:54:06,440
Speaker 1: enjoyed their work more. And I think all of those

1024
00:54:06,480 --> 00:54:09,839
Speaker 1: things were true about Matt and I when we went

1025
00:54:09,880 --> 00:54:14,759
Speaker 1: to working four hard days at this podcast instead of

1026
00:54:15,560 --> 00:54:20,000
Speaker 1: expanding it to five. And so I hope, I hope

1027
00:54:20,080 --> 00:54:23,960
Speaker 1: not everyone has that ability, that unilateral ability. I totally

1028
00:54:23,960 --> 00:54:26,640
Speaker 1: get that. But if you run your own business, you

1029
00:54:26,760 --> 00:54:29,480
Speaker 1: do your own thing. I think sometimes we assume if

1030
00:54:29,520 --> 00:54:32,560
Speaker 1: I put in more hours, like the output is going

1031
00:54:32,600 --> 00:54:36,040
Speaker 1: to be significantly better, and I just I'm not saying

1032
00:54:36,080 --> 00:54:39,760
Speaker 1: that's completely untrue, but I think you need to reconsider

1033
00:54:40,320 --> 00:54:42,800
Speaker 1: whether it is one hundred percent true and whether or

1034
00:54:42,920 --> 00:54:48,080
Speaker 1: not you can accomplish similar feats in less time. And

1035
00:54:48,480 --> 00:54:51,960
Speaker 1: also like this really leads to bigger questions of what

1036
00:54:52,040 --> 00:54:56,080
Speaker 1: life is about and what ultimately matters. And gardening is

1037
00:54:56,120 --> 00:55:00,560
Speaker 1: not an economically productive activity. You know, running not an

1038
00:55:00,560 --> 00:55:04,319
Speaker 1: economically productive activity. There are so many hobbies that you

1039
00:55:04,360 --> 00:55:07,840
Speaker 1: can engage in like coffee with a friend on a

1040
00:55:08,000 --> 00:55:10,719
Speaker 1: leisurely two hour coffee with a friend is not an

1041
00:55:10,760 --> 00:55:15,239
Speaker 1: economically productive activity, but those things greatly matter to our

1042
00:55:15,280 --> 00:55:18,879
Speaker 1: ability to enjoy this one life that we're on earth

1043
00:55:18,920 --> 00:55:22,440
Speaker 1: here to enjoy. So I encourage you to wrestle with

1044
00:55:22,719 --> 00:55:24,480
Speaker 1: some of these things, and maybe even next time you're

1045
00:55:24,480 --> 00:55:28,960
Speaker 1: applying for jobs, look specifically for employers who say, actually, yeah,

1046
00:55:29,120 --> 00:55:31,799
Speaker 1: this is something we prioritize, four hour or four day

1047
00:55:31,840 --> 00:55:36,320
Speaker 1: work weeks, this is this is something that we have adopted,

1048
00:55:36,480 --> 00:55:40,000
Speaker 1: and then maybe those become more appealing places to work

1049
00:55:40,120 --> 00:55:43,799
Speaker 1: as well, and hopefully this becomes like a tidal wave

1050
00:55:43,840 --> 00:55:46,640
Speaker 1: of sorts where other businesses are like, gosh, just to

1051
00:55:46,719 --> 00:55:50,000
Speaker 1: keep pace and to keep attracting good talent, we have

1052
00:55:50,040 --> 00:55:52,120
Speaker 1: to go down to a four hour work week, or

1053
00:55:52,760 --> 00:55:56,319
Speaker 1: those people aren't even gonna entertain working working here. So

1054
00:55:56,800 --> 00:55:59,480
Speaker 1: thank you, as always for listening. I appreciate your time

1055
00:55:59,520 --> 00:56:01,920
Speaker 1: and attention. See you back here on Friday with a

1056
00:56:01,960 --> 00:56:05,399
Speaker 1: fresh Friday flight. Until then, best friend out,