When You Were Employed, Or Still Are, Number Of Hours Worked?

Discussion in 'Not Sure Where it Goes' started by Cody Fousnaugh, Jul 17, 2018.

  1. Cody Fousnaugh

    Cody Fousnaugh Supreme Member
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    For the couple of years I worked in EMS, I'd work a full 24 hour shift. Yep, sleep right at the office, which was inside of a small rented house. After that job, got OJT for warehouse work and worked an 8-hour day shift with weekends off. IOW, 40 hrs. a week and I loved it. Had Friday and Saturday night to party, if I so desired, and the rest of the weekend to go to a Swap Meet, movie or whatever. My salary was generally $9 to $10 per hour, but I didn't have much or need much. I rented a furnished room in a house and my vehicle was pretty old. I only went out to eat on weekend mornings and would get a full breakfast for $2.99.

    Now, there are those that put in many, many hours per week, and sometimes weekends, to pay for the lifestyle their family has. Unfortunately, those long hours can affect a marriage and/or the children's lives. "I hardly ever see my husband" or "I hardly ever see my dad" wives and children will say.

    Years ago, I met a gal that was going thru a divorce, in part due to the amount of hours her husband worked for an aerospace company. Basically, he would leave and come home from work when her and her kids were asleep. He'd sometimes work 7 days a week. Of course he'd have a 2-week vacation during the summer and a week off during Christmas, but the rest of the time, the dude was at work. She told me that one time she encountered him about his hours and he told her "do you really think I can afford this house, our motorhome, our ski boat and the jet ski on my hourly salary without any overtime? What it comes down to is, do you want me at home in the evenings and weekends, or want this lifestyle? You can't have both!" They divorced, but she got to keep everything. She did have a low-paying part-time job.

    So, what is more important...……..working long hours, sometimes voluntarily, to pay for a lifestyle, or being with family? Wife and I would chose, being together. What about you?
     
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  2. Chrissy Cross

    Chrissy Cross Supreme Member
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    My kids have perfect jobs being dentists. They only work 4 days a week and just 8 hr days.

    My daughter has cut down to only working 2-3 days now.

    They also take off quite a few weeks during the year for trips but of course they aren't paid then because they aren't salaried.
     
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  3. Cody Fousnaugh

    Cody Fousnaugh Supreme Member
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    All I can say is...…...YES!!
     
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  4. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    When I worked for Champion Paper Company, I was earning more than $30 an hour, with time and a half, double time, and triple time for overtime. As the senior machine adjuster, I could come into work whenever I wanted to, and pretty much stay as long as I liked, so I rang up a lot of overtime. Usually, my shift was 11 pm to 7 am but, once my son was old enough that he wasn't home a lot anyhow, I would go to work whenever I found myself not doing anything productive, and stay until I got tired. So that was a lot of hours.

    Like @Cody Fousnaugh, as a paramedic, we worked long hours anyhow, but my first paid job in EMS was as EMS director and health inspector. I had a regular 9-5 job with the city, plus I was on call the rest of the day, seven days a week. During that period, I also taught EMT and paramedic classes for Texas Southmost College and worked as a skills examiner for the Texas Department of Health, and both were paid positions.

    Otherwise, medics usually worked 24-hour shifts, and 48-hours shifts weren't unusual. When someone was working a 48-hour shift, we'd schedule them at one of our slower stations so there would be a greater chance of getting some sleep. Sometimes, a 24-hour shift would consist of back-to-back calls, while there were shifts where we had no calls at all.

    At Duro, my shift was 11 pm to 7 am but, as an adjuster-supervisor, I had to be there an hour early. At the end of the shift, if there were any issues that the plant manager wanted to discuss, I would have to stay over. Or, if any of my bank of machines wasn't running right, or if an order change was scheduled, I'd have to stay over until things were running smoothly for the day shift. Once every couple of weeks, I'd have to come in for a 2 pm supervisor's meeting.

    Now, I work from home and am working only 30 hours a week. Plus, these hours can be done whenever I want to. Theoretically, if I wanted to work two 15-hour shifts a week, I could do that but I wouldn't be very efficient during a 15-hour day, so I don't know how long I could do that.
     
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  5. Vinny Waccio

    Vinny Waccio Very Well-Known Member
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    I worked 6 days a week and spent about 3 months worth of time traveling on business, mostly overseas. We relocate 8 times to further my career. We had no children. My wife never had to work but did when she got bored. She never complained because we both came from very poor families and wanted a better life. Plus I enjoyed the work I did and was recognized as one of two worldwide experts in my field and all that goes with it. My wife was great and was very supportive of me.

    Once I made it I was being hired just to associate my name to the company. Once I reached my mid 40's I started working from home and in my 50's I reduced my hours and then reduced my days. I am now 67 and up to a week ago I was working 2 days a week from home and most weeks I had nothing to do. I was there just in case I was needed. Despite my work my wife and I took 4 vacations a year. Money was never a problem and we are living in our 9th house so we got to make new friends and explore new areas when we relocated. My wife has everything she ever wanted and our love is very strong men after 46 years of marriage. We managed to have fun and spend time together. My employers would often fly my wife out to stay with me if I was going to be gone for more than 2 weeks at a time.

    We have had a good life and due to my hard work in the beginning, we have a worry free retirement. You can work hard and play hard. We also learned that spending too much time together can be a bad thing in a marriage especially when you work from home. We have learned to give the other their own space so we are not always together. We never had a problem due to my job and my work ethic made it so we never had to worry about money, which can cause a lot of divorces. It allowed us to become upper class after starting from dirt poor. We belonged to private clubs, hired limos to go out on the town, custom made clothes and expensive cars. We had a ball and then after we did all that we ever wanted to do, we stepped back in income and work hours and settled in middle class were we like the people much better and feel more comfortable in. Now we have at least 20 years to be together with no work while many we know are still working into their 70's or living from Social Security check to check.

    Work hard and make as much as you can when young so you can enjoy your golden years. However, find time to play and have fun. I worked hard and long so that we could have fun. We always made time for fun and vacations. We had a blast because we found ways to work hard and long yet still have time for each other.
     
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  6. Holly Saunders

    Holly Saunders Supreme Member
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    I worked long hours..an average of an 11 hour day.. and my husband works a regular 15 hour day , including an hours' travel..

    WE don't work these hours to have any extravagant lifestyle, we're comfortable.. but we're not rich by any means

    However Cody , many people work long hours in minimum wage jobs just to survive , nothing to do with extravagant living , they work just to earn enough to feed their families, and pay bills.
     
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  7. Sheldon Scott

    Sheldon Scott Supreme Member
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    My normal work schedule was 8 hour days five days per week but the last few years before I retired I worked almost every Saturday and most Sundays. The extra money sure came in handy building up my retirement funds.
     
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  8. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Vinny Waccio "Work hard and make as much as you can when young so you can enjoy your golden years."

    Agreed, and understood! It must be stated here only in the past tense, as many of us are pretty old already (would have liked to say old codgers and old bags......;) ), and it is for many too late to obey and follow a very profound statement! :(

    Frank
     
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  9. Cody Fousnaugh

    Cody Fousnaugh Supreme Member
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    My brother and his wife both retired from companies. She told me that she would pretty much do whatever it took to keep her job and retire at it. She said "long hours and midnight shift were part of it".

    For those that stay at one job for years upon years, to get those monthly retirement payments, there are those folks that can't stay on a job for years upon years for different reasons...…...layoff, company closes and department closes, just to name a few. As for me, I've seen at least two company close after I left.
     
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  10. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    I have had very few jobs that I hated. For the most part, I enjoyed going to work and had fun while I was there. If I hadn't been injured and if I were still able to lift my half of people who weighed five hundred pounds, I would still be working as a paramedic. I have friends who are still working as paramedics into their 70s. For that matter, although I didn't enjoy Duro so much, I liked working as a machine adjuster in a paper bag plant. Operating the machines was even more fun but it didn't pay as much.
     
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  11. Cody Fousnaugh

    Cody Fousnaugh Supreme Member
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    I've had two jobs that I really liked, but did like one more than the other. Both of them involved Purchasing Assistant, but the second one also involved Inventory Management. First one, lower hourly pay and shared office space with the shop manager/buyer. Second one, had my own office, computer, phone and the highest salary I'd ever made. Was so, so grateful to finally not have to do hard physical labor in a warehouse anymore. I did do some work in the warehouse, but it was very, very light lifting. The second job I really, really loved, but wife and I quit our jobs, sold our house and left Colorado. Should have never left Colorado, let alone our jobs.
     
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  12. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Cody Fousnaugh
    My nephew got his technical degree, finally, after a stint in the Marine Corp. and some years of working as a welder. He then was hired by Southwestern Bell Telephone Co., a part of the "Ma Bell" system. When 1984 rolled around, and the Fed required the Bell "break-up", he was not certain what the future held. The break up included creation of "new" companies, which replaced the various "Bells". Some kept the word Bell in their names, though they were no longer owned by American Telephone and Telegraph, the parent of all the Bells. A-T-& T owned and operated Bell Labs, which had performed extremely well, having made the world's first transistors and other solid-state components. Bell Labs became Lucent Technology, for many years a leader in technology, but bucking competition from other semi-conductor giants, several located in Europe. Lucent went from 165,000 employees down to 30,000.

    Dan, my nephew, stuck it out with Southwester Bell, which became SBC. Huge cutbacks in employee numbers there resulted in the ridiculous assigning of work-load from those laid off to those remaining. Dan engineered "switches", which were new land-line installs in new housing developments. He was handed the work load of ten employees, and told to do what he could. He told me towards the end he could have worked 24/7 and not ever have caught up. He prepared for retirement, and took their early offer in 2002, at age 55. One of the initial dangling carrots when he was hired by SBC many years earlier, was lifetime complete medical coverage paid by the company. Two years after his retirement, they rescinded that. All during his career with SBC, he had believed with near-religious fervor that the great big, grand and powerful, Bell subsidiary was to be 100% reliable; it's word proved otherwise.
    Frank
     
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  13. Steve North

    Steve North Supreme Member
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    I worked as a "Commercial Investment Consultant" for many years in Montreal.. I worked generally from about Labour Day in early September to about July 1st and then I was off as most of my clients were on vacation, and those that were not were not interested in investing during the summer months.. I had my own office with an employees that would also work those dates..
    That gave me all the time during the summer to be with my family and do whatever we wanted..
    During the working part of the year, I worked from about 8:00am to about 4:00pm and only 5 days a week with Friday afternoon quitting early.. NEVER on week-ends.. Well, not very often..
    I worked for a commission or a finder's fee only.. I would pay my income tax like everyone and working in Quebec, I also paid provincial income tax as well as Federal.. I objected paying double taxes but had NO choice..
    Well, today, now have 2 pensions from both Quebec and Federal which is a blessing.. No company pension as I was self employed..
    I did manage to put away some $$$ during my BIG years in a retirement investment to which today I am also grateful..
    Generally we live very comfortably and can say we have everything in life we want and can afford to buy whatever we want without a second thought..
     
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