Sigh. I've had to deal with this as well now that our engineering org is full remote. What it comes down to is that our leadership doesn't trust us, even though we consistently and repeatedly deliver releases on time and on budget. If our engineering leadership was comfortable with compensating us for the desired outcomes they want to generate value for the company, this wouldn't be an issue. Somehow I'm guessing they feel uncomfortable that we could all be getting our work done in 4 hours every day and then going outside to play.

They're not uncomfortable about it, they see that as breach of contract and would like you to either take a pay cut or work the full 8. We get paid 'by the hour' and not by a contracted amount of work no matter how much time is spent. Our whole regular workforce is structured around hourly wages, full time and/or part time employment in something described as a 'job'. If you start upending that it is important to realize that employers have a dominant position right now and that upsetting that position may not end well for those that really only do four hours of actual work during an 8 hour day.

> ...upsetting that position may not end well for those that really only do four hours of actual work during an 8 hour day.

One of the great shocks in my life was finding out the sheer number of employees to which this applies. The most obvious places were the various BigCo's I worked at, but it applied almost anywhere.

Now just the drudgery and pointlessness of much of their work made me sympathetic to their slacking-off, but it was the constant anxiety of appearing busy that made it seem truly miserable.

At some point in my early twenties I'd had both the high-pressure, still-smelling-of-fries-after-a-shower type of experience of working at McDonald's or various restaurants, as well as the experience of sitting in the office with various just-below-board-member managers of one of the major insurance companies here.

Aside from the possible issues resulting from the physical strain, and having to live more frugally, McDonald's struck me as preferable to the latter (but neither seemed like any kind of world I want to live in or actively maintain, if possible).

I don't know if this is a personal thing, but I would go for a job where I need to focus and work over a job where I need to pretend to focus and work anytime. And most office jobs seem to have more of the latter than I can imagine anyone tolerating.

100% this. I had a government job, could have worked my way to a nice pension and everything... but I realized a few years in that my mental health probably would not survive the slog. Half the average day (easily) was totally eaten up by small talk, surfing the web and/or making personal journal entries. Another quarter of the day was meetings, often with snacks. I took long lunches. There were days when I did probably less than hour of actual work. And all the while I kept thinking, "why was I happier when I had my nose to the grind in the private sector?"

Most people need to feel useful on some level or they lose motivation and their brains go sour. There are exceptions to this rule, and those people should definitely dedicate their lives to finding a cushy office job. I would literally rather drive rideshare, and I have. [Not since March 12th, though-- fortunately my S.O. is able to cover bills until I can go back to driving and/or try to find a software job worth showing up for again.]

Perhaps a side-note, but my most of my experience is the private sector. While the government jobs I've experienced were mostly 'the same' in all the bad ways, at least the pressure seemed a bit lower.

I just wanted to point that out, because I find it extremely frustrating to discuss these matters with various friends who are all in agreement, but then somehow believe this is just a government thing, and as a result seem to be drinking more and more of the 'corporations and the free market optimize this shit away and socialism is bad' kool-aid. Which strikes me as both a simplistic and ineffective conclusion to draw, if we're thinking about better ways to do things.

Oversimplifying, but in my experience the private sector, at scale, is often just as inefficient and bullshitty and mind-numbing and depressing as a government entity, just with less job protection, higher pressure, and perhaps often less of a meaningful societal value, however inefficiently achieved.

And perhaps worst of all, you get managers/bosses who are not just content to do an okay job at their current position, but actively employ a ruthlessness and ambition that makes their stupidity all the more problematic.

> in my experience the private sector, at scale, is often just as inefficient and bullshitty and mind-numbing and depressing as a government entity, just with less job protection, higher pressure, and perhaps often less of a meaningful societal value

This is a great point. Having worked at several large companies in addition to both state and federal government agencies, I mostly agree. I hated not being efficient in government work, but at least there was less B.S. pressure and some sense of 'greater good' decoupled from profit incentives (although there were definitely still budget constraints).

Yeah, that's the horror of it: they don't want your work output, they want your time.

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edit to add:

I worked at Google as a TVC for a couple of years and somewhere in there I became convinced that (at least part of) what was going on was that they were sequestering talent. Hiring people and parking them in idle tasks to keep them from becoming competitors.

It's probably not true, but it was slightly more reassuring than believing that they were just that wasteful.

(I.e. our five-years-and-counting project and team of dozens could have been replaced by about three people and finished in a year. But nobody wanted to hear that. In other words, the situations was "works as intended".)

> What it comes down to is that our leadership doesn't trust us...

This seems to be the argument against UBI, as well.