In tough economy, working 7 days becomes norm for some - how many days per week do you work?

[Liberal_in_LA]

In tough economy, working 7 days becomes norm for some

http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/02/23/seven.days.irpt/index.html

By Rachel Rodriguez
CNN

(CNN) -- Kevin Fernandez says he'll do whatever it takes to make sure his family is happy and healthy -- even if that means never taking a day off from work.

Kevin Fernandez works seven days a week to support his wife and two children, pictured here.

Fernandez has a full-time job with FedEx corporate in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he trains managers from around the country. He also spends every weekend and up to two other nights working at a local grocery store. He says working 7 days a week takes its toll.

"It's very hard," he said. "Like right now, I'm holding my 6-week-old baby, and there's only a few nights a week I actually get to see . I have an 18-month-old daughter upstairs going to bed."

Fernandez originally took on his grocery store job so that his family could start building up their savings. But in December, he says "the bomb dropped." FedEx announced that they would be reducing his salary and cutting its contributions to employee 401(k)s. It was then he knew that he would need that extra income -- along with his "meager savings" -- just to pay the bills, and that he wouldn't be getting a day off any time soon.

[StrongBad]

1. The definition of "working poor".

[Hello_Kitty]

2. Nobody should be working 7 days a week when others are out of work

Piling more hours and responsibilities on existing workers is a way that companies skimp.

[nichomachus]

18. This is why unions had to be destroyed n/t

[Doremus]

34. I'm self-employed so I'm not putting anyone out of work.

If I don't work 7 days, the work doesn't get done and I'm done for. There are lots of other reasons someone would put in those kind of hours. Holding 2 or 3 jobs to put food on the table, for one.

Painting with a broad brush is seldom accurate.

[Hello_Kitty]

35. That's your choice

The article in the OP is about (non-self employed) people working overtime at a job or more than one job. Meanwhile other people are out of work. The goal of the Ownership Class is to eradicate all good-paying jobs with benefits and replace them with crappy gigs that the starving proles fight over.

[Doremus]

36. We just need a fvcking revolution.

Start with a general strike and go from there.

I've just about reached my limit. Hopefully more of us are coming to same conclusion.

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

[KansDem]

3. Back in the late 1990s, I was working three part-time jobs...

...and I was working seven days a week. I did this for about two years until a full-time position opened up. The only days off I had occurred when the organizations I was working for observed a holiday. Otherwise, every day at 1pm I was some place in a shirt and tie.

Now I'm at five days, but might have to take on a second part-time job for financial reasons.

[TlalocW]

4. I work 6 to 7

Some of it is necessity - trying to pay down bills and well as help out my retired mom with bills, and some of it is brought on by myself as I don't normally say no to contracting jobs from my past company (computer programming), and I also have a side business of entertaining (balloon twisting and magic) and doing balloon decor that I would like to become my main income source.

TlalocW

[backtoblue]

7. 6 days

I am a single mom who works 6 days a week- and I'm still not making ends meet.

[laylah]

24. ...

:hug:

[backtoblue]

26. ..

t/y :hi:

[riderinthestorm]

5. 7 days/week for the past 10 years.

Haven't had a vacation in all that time either.

Farmer, small business owner, I also work part-time writing grants for non-profit causes I care about. I had hoped that this would be "my year" to take some time off and maybe (gasp!) take a small vacation but alas, that's not going to happen. We're keeping our head above water, and I believe our business is solid but I'm not taking any chances after working this hard.

[kestrel91316]

25. Veterinarian, small business owner, working 6 days a week for 17+ years,

so I gotcha beat by a few.

At least I manage to get away for 5-6 days a year to visit family. And BOY do I relish those 3-day weekends, because it's the only real weekends I get.

[riderinthestorm]

37. Gawd, what a terrible thing to "beat" me at....

:hug:

I think we've crossed paths on other "animal" threads. I own a training/breeding farm for dressage/combined training horses. It's wild when you're involved with animals on any scale - it becomes impossible to leave. One of my field service vets is a racehorse owner/breeder - he also lives the "no vacation" life. He says his "vacations" are the high he gets when one of his runners actually wins a race!

That said, I do believe we need to meet somewhere warm, and maybe sandy, with the waves lapping, and a stack of books for a REAL vacation... someday.

Cheers and get some sleep!

[elifino]

6. I telecommute 30 hours per week

I actually retired from full time work three years ago. I am now in my 50th year with this company. I just lost my wife a few weeks ago and I am the primary care giver for my dad who is 96,so I like having something to keep me busy.

elifino

[ejpoeta]

12. i wish i could do that.

[Wickerman]

15. I'm sorry to hear about your wife

and it's awfully good of you to care for your father.

Glad you find time for DU. :thumbsup:

[elifino]

20. Thanks, DU is another way to pass the time.

DU and my work, IT Support, , make the time pass a little faster. I do not post much but I visit here often.

elifino

[SammyWinstonJack]

31. .

:hug:

[madrchsod]

8. i`m retired and my wife works 4-6 days a week

she works 37 hours plus as much overtime she wants

[MADem]

9. I used to work seven days a week and got thirty days of leave a year.

Half the time I couldn't use the leave due to operational issues.

I like being retired! It took awhile to get used to it, but I'm in the groove now!

I feel sorry for people who have to work more than they need to, or who want more work and can't find it.

[ejpoeta]

10. it's uniquely american in many ways.

Remember when bush said something similar to that to that person at one of his 'town hall' shows? we work ourselves to death in this country. just to survive in many cases.

[flvegan]

11. I work a full 5 days, and parts of 2. So yeah, 7.

[Myrina]

27. Same here - averaged about 52 hrs/wk between a FT and PT job

Left the PT job several months ago because the FT was overwhelmingly stressful, 3 weeks ago the FT job went away.

So now I've got ZERO.


Sigh.

[guitar man]

13. I was working 7

5 at my full time gig and all the side work I could rustle up. Now the side work had died off, the economy took it...my day gig is probably next :(

[ComtesseDeSpair]

14. I telecommute 5 days "officially"...

But I'm so swamped with work lately I have been working 7 days though I'm not paid for it. Ah, the joys of being a salaried employee...

[NikolaC]

22. My Husband and Sister

are in a similar boat. They both are salaried and work seven days a week essentially. It is not unusual to see them on their blackberries and laptops sometimes working till 3 a.m. and then going in to work the next day. I, on the other hand, have been trying to find work for the last several months. However it is difficult because I was a stay at home Mom for three years. My heart goes out to all of those who are working their butts off with no respite. Unfortunately slave labor is big with the corps and many have no choice but to work those hours for fear of losing their income and being stuck without work for the foreseeable future.

[tjwash]

16. Isn't that just great? That is just uniquely American...

:puke:

[nichomachus]

17. The guy who piloted the plane that crashed in Buffalo

worked a second job stocking shelves in a grocery store just to make ends meet. Commuter air pilots make crap. Do you think that may have had something to do with the fact he might not have been 100 percent on the ball.

[Liberal_in_LA]

41. seriously? I had not idea. that's a strange combo: Pilot and shelf stocker

[greendog]

19. 4 days a week ~ 40 hrs, more or less.

[Justpat]

21. I work with race horses

and I have worked seven days a week since 1969.

That includes all holidays that are normally a day off for regular people.

Horses are not a business to get into unless it is a passion first and a job second.

[riderinthestorm]

38. Dressage/combined training breeder and trainer here.

:hi:

I'm in northern Illinois. So far we're holding steady business-wise. No big client drop-offs, lessons and training proceeding as usual. My husband decided to stay up north this fall instead of competing in Florida - that was our only concession to the economy. We did however, send our oldest daughter down to compete with 2 of our youngsters and her 3-Day horse that she needs another qualifying score with to jump up to Advanced.

How's racing doing, from the insiders perspective?

[Blue_In_AK]

23. I'm self-employed.

When I have work, I work seven days a week, when I don't, I don't. I try to cram in as much as I can when it's available because there are times I don't have anything to do for several days -- or even weeks occasionally.

[Xenotime]

28. I work seven days just to make ends meet.

[damntexdem]

29. I clicked 5, but it is slightly different.

Some semesters, I teach on a few Saturdays.

[Arctic Dave]

30. I am a shift worker. I work two weeks on (600 miles away) 12 hours plus a day, two weeks off.

I will sometimes work when I'm home, if it a place I have never been or if they need it done pronto.

[TahitiNut]

32. It might be more realistic to ask "How many days of work are you paid for?"

Just sayin'. :shrug:

[Liberal_in_LA]

42. good point

[mtnester]

33. As a small business family...one of us works one job, 7 days a week

12 hours a day

The other of us works a 40 hour job, then does all the bookwork (another 15 - 20 hours per week))

Then, that same bookwork guru (and inside IT person and advertising contact)does most of the housework (except for the trash, and sometimes we share laundry and dishes...depends on whose laundry and who has the extra 5 minutes for dishes), and once summer starts, same bookkeeper does the outside work (except for the push mower areas)..includes all yard maintenance for 3 acres, bushes, trees, weed eater, planters, garden, etc. Pool maintenance also...except for setting up and tearing down filters, and adding anti freeze for winter.

So, in a nutshell, both of us work 7 days a week, more than 10 hours per day on the average.

We need to downsize big time....hope to move to where we can do more zeroscaping, more garden, once the market gets hopping a bit.

Oh, we are also helping my father move his farming into organic areas..beginning with some upcoming fall crops and the complete revitalizing of land to organic status....and are setting up some shadowing with some smoking masters on bringing the original family smokehouse back to life.

Edit for unfortunate typo that may have inferred hubs or I were a "bot" as opposed to the proper word needed (both)

[Juche]

39. 3 or 4

But I work 12 hour shifts.

[yewberry]

40. I work 5 days, but cannot work overtime.

In my office, we have more work than we can possibly do in 40 hours. We are a state agency, though, and cannot pay for overtime. We work off the clock, sure, to try to keep up. No, we're not supposed to, but what can you do? We've got thousands of employees who need help; can we just ignore that?

So, my "regular job" OT is not paid.

I do pickup work editing dissertations and manuscripts for academic publishers. I'm lucky thus far--I can say yes or no depending on how busy I am, but I can't imagine saying no at this point. I sure do get tired, though. I'd like a day off.

[Skittles]

43. right now 6 - four nighttime and 2 daytime

now THAT is a beating

[Liberal_in_LA]

44. I'd imagine switching from the night to the day must be wearing

[Skittles]

45. get off work at 6AM Wednesday and be back at 8:00 AM Thursday

easy in your 20's - a true beating at age 51 :o

[MrSlayer]

46. Zero right now. Laid off for a month.

I wouldn't mind working 7 days a week. In my business the OT is where the real money is.