The five states where Americans' work the longest AK, WY, ND, TX, LA

[GON]

Earlier this morning I read an article that stated Americans in Alaska, Wyoming, North Dakota, Texas, and Louisiana work the longest hours.

The article IMO has many flaws. Many of these jobs are in the raw material and energy sector. Those jobs often have long hours but have lots of time off.

Two examples in Alaska. Police in Bethel, AK work 12-hour shifts for 14 days straight. Then get 14 days off. Like situations for energy workers in Alaska's north slope.

All goes to show- articles like this are not true holistic studies, but instead some author's hypothesis based on limited/ selected, or cherry picked data.

The 5 states where Americans are working the longest hours—they aren’t New York or California

The United States has one of the longest workweeks in the world – 1,791 hours per year, or 3.44 hours per week – according to the World Economic Forum.

www.cnbc.com

 

[joekingcorvette]

I am surprised Alaska was listed due to the climate and weather conditions. Very interesting.

 

[GON]

I am surprised Alaska was listed due to the climate and weather conditions. Very interesting.

One (of numerous) statistic about Alaska, the majority of the Alaskan population live on land that is considered a rain forest.

 

[SC Maintenance]

Maybe people there are ambitious and like to work - or like what they do?

 

[PimTac]

In Wyoming, North Dakota and Texas you have ranchers and farmers who work long hours for most of their lives. That would skew things a bit.

 

[Bullwinkle007]

A lot of industrial type of jobs do work 12 hour rotating shifts. The nature of the beast. In the winter I do snow removal, we work 12hr rotating shifts, 7/days a week until the storm is over. The longest I've gone is 42 days straight. No complaints. Lots of OT,

 

[wpod]

A lot of industrial type of jobs do work 12 hour rotating shifts. The nature of the beast. In the winter I do snow removal, we work 12hr rotating shifts, 7/days a week until the storm is over. The longest I've gone is 42 days straight. No complaints. Lots of OT,

That must be brutal.

 

[MrHorspwer]

All goes to show- articles like this are not true holistic studies, but instead some author's hypothesis based on limited/ selected, or cherry picked data.

The article isn't a study. The article is reporting about studies, specifically mentioning and linking to four of them, from the World Economic Forum, WalletHub, the U.S. BEA, and Stanford. The author isn't making a "hypothesis" about the top 5 ranking: It's directly from the WalletHub report.

This is actually good reporting. There's no conclusion anywhere in the article. It explains the data from the cited reports and studies. It cites every single one of it's sources, both studies/reports and individual contributors, and provides links to them. It's not an in-depth synopsis of any single report (they're all there if you'd like to read them and draw your own conclusion), it's an article corroborating trends and findings from multiple reports.

Those jobs often have long hours but have lots of time off.

This is really what your beef is with the article.

This is explained in the article (and in the WalletHub study):

WalletHub based its ranking off of data from the U.S. Census Bureau, which estimated the mean number of hours worked in the past 12 months for workers aged 16-64 in 2020, the most recent year for which data is available.

The scenario of working hard but having lots of time off is in the calculation. It's been accounted for. The WalletHub report looked at 12 months of data from 2020. The mean (average) of an entire years worth of workweeks would include both workweeks with hours and workweeks with zero hours.

Using your scenario of two-weeks-on and two-weeks-off in Alaska, to reach a 41.4 hours/week mean over a four week period would be 82.8 hours/week worked for two weeks and 0 hours worked for two weeks.

The math checks out.

You're either disagreeing with the U.S. Census Bureau's data (and not disagreeing with the author) or you actually DO agree with the article.

 

[JohnnyG]

They must not know too much about river boats and their Deck Hands. 6 hrs on 6 hrs off, two shifts a day, 7 days a week, 4 months before a break (30 days off).
Tried that once, couldn't do it.

 

[slo town]

Earlier this morning I read an article that stated Americans in Alaska, Wyoming, North Dakota, Texas, and Louisiana work the longest hours.

The article IMO has many flaws. Many of these jobs are in the raw material and energy sector. Those jobs often have long hours but have lots of time off.

Two examples in Alaska. Police in Bethel, AK work 12-hour shifts for 14 days straight. Then get 14 days off. Like situations for energy workers in Alaska's north slope.

All goes to show- articles like this are not true holistic studies, but instead some author's hypothesis based on limited/ selected, or cherry picked data.

The 5 states where Americans are working the longest hours—they aren’t New York or California

The United States has one of the longest workweeks in the world – 1,791 hours per year, or 3.44 hours per week – according to the World Economic Forum.

www.cnbc.com

Does this study consider salaried workers? I worked in Silicon Valley my entire 25 year career for a Fortune 100 company. My hours were never tracked by anyone. I never had set office hours and never filled out a time card my entire career. Most of what I did was project related, most projects lasting 6 months or more. Sometimes I worked 70+ hours per week just to stay alive because a project was being difficult. Other times I took entire weeks off without even telling anyone. I worked remotely from my home office for 8 years and never talked to my manager more than once or twice a month.

How can a study like this consider these factors? It is my belief that most salaried workers in my line of work put in far more hours than these studies account for. The measure of achievement in my business was meeting deadlines, not the number of hours worked. If a person was good at what they do and could manage their time well, it can be a long and lucrative career. If a person had poor time management skills they never lasted long.

And because these projects were comprised of teams, you never wanted to let your team down because their success depended on your success. Many people think Silicon Valley work is a coddled business. I can tell you it wasn't in my experience. It was non-union, "at will" employment. Salaries were a zero sum game. If you got a big raise, a bonus, or stock options it came at the expense of someone else. It was survival of the fittest.

FWIW,

Scott

Edit: Back in the old days my colleagues and I used to ask each other, "Has anyone seen so-and-so? I haven't seen him for weeks." Sometimes we joked whether or not they had died. Well, my oldest son is a police officer in Silicon Valley. Every so often some high tech worker goes MIA and the employer asks for a welfare check. Several times my son says the police department has found that person dead in their home. No joke.

 

[kkreit01]

I grew up on a farm in ND, and believe this list. I'm sure SD and IA isn't too far down on the list. Farmers work from sun up -- 'til past sundown during planting and harvesting. In addition, it's not real dark until 10:30 PM in the middle of summer in ND. When you're not planting and harvesting, you're still working long days: spraying, cultivating, working summer fallow, repairing/maintaining machinery, etc. I often looked forward to the long winter, so we could all rest.

 

[wpod]

In the early day the silicon Valley tech workers were coddled.

 

[aquariuscsm]

Yep, I believe it. Seems all I do is work.

 

[Bullwinkle007]

That must be brutal.

I'll take the OT, and the per diem and hotel rewards. It does suck missing family, work the holidays so 80 stays open. We earn OT and holiday credits. Thanksgiving weekend is all OT and 2 8 hour holiday credits. Honestly plowing snow on the freeway is easy money. The hardest part honestly is dealing with the traveling public getting in the way. We could be 3 or 4 trucks wide with the wing plows out and they still want to pass. A lot of the time CHP will cruise behind us to keep the public out of our way.

 

[BlueOvalFitter]

Earlier this morning I read an article that stated Americans in Alaska, Wyoming, North Dakota, Texas, and Louisiana work the longest hours.

The article IMO has many flaws. Many of these jobs are in the raw material and energy sector. Those jobs often have long hours but have lots of time off.

Two examples in Alaska. Police in Bethel, AK work 12-hour shifts for 14 days straight. Then get 14 days off. Like situations for energy workers in Alaska's north slope.

All goes to show- articles like this are not true holistic studies, but instead some author's hypothesis based on limited/ selected, or cherry picked data.

The 5 states where Americans are working the longest hours—they aren’t New York or California

The United States has one of the longest workweeks in the world – 1,791 hours per year, or 3.44 hours per week – according to the World Economic Forum.

www.cnbc.com

Seriously, Louisiana? Around here where I live (Avoyelles Parish) they put up new business buildings, do road work, and build houses, etc., at a snail's pace! They love making Rain Turtles around here to encourage getting the rest of the day off. Or not go into work at all.
LOL, Louisiana............

 

[Fitter30]

Ran industrial and commercial heating and air conditioning. Process chillers and boilers in factories were the worst. Work round the clock till machine was running. 50-60 hour weeks were normal with some 100 weeks thrown in.Got divorce and my health suffered. Money was good but looking back 40-45 hours a week more than enough.

 

[Aredeeem]

Earlier this morning I read an article that stated Americans in Alaska, Wyoming, North Dakota, Texas, and Louisiana work the longest hours.

The article IMO has many flaws. Many of these jobs are in the raw material and energy sector. Those jobs often have long hours but have lots of time off.

Two examples in Alaska. Police in Bethel, AK work 12-hour shifts for 14 days straight. Then get 14 days off. Like situations for energy workers in Alaska's north slope.

All goes to show- articles like this are not true holistic studies, but instead some author's hypothesis based on limited/ selected, or cherry picked data.

The 5 states where Americans are working the longest hours—they aren’t New York or California

The United States has one of the longest workweeks in the world – 1,791 hours per year, or 3.44 hours per week – according to the World Economic Forum.

www.cnbc.com

The 12 hour shifts for 14 days aren’t the problem. The 14 days off in a row would be unbearable. Takes a strong marriage

 

[chrlsful]

wake up, go to wrk on the farm, have breakfast, go to work @ (name it: school, factory, garage, etc). Come home do some farm chores, eat, go in basement and run the lathe & other equip for side income (huntin/fishin money). Sleep? yeah so I can eat / go to wrk...

 

[brianl703]

Seriously, Louisiana? Around here where I live (Avoyelles Parish) they put up new business buildings, do road work, and build houses, etc., at a snail's pace! They love making Rain Turtles around here to encourage getting the rest of the day off. Or not go into work at all.
LOL, Louisiana............

I think there's a certain contingent of people who only work the bare minimum that they absolutely have to. And they tend to be concentrated in certain areas.

 

[BlueOvalFitter]

Ran industrial and commercial heating and air conditioning. Process chillers and boilers in factories were the worst. Work round the clock till machine was running. 50-60 hour weeks were normal with some 100 weeks thrown in.Got divorce and my health suffered. Money was good but looking back 40-45 hours a week more than enough.

I too did commercial/industrial HVAC (25 years HVAC and 14 years petroleum piping). The last 12 years of my career was running a fab shop for prefab on chillers, cooling towers, condensate pipe, boilers, AHU's, fan coils, VAV's, etc., to go to the jobs in the field. We would use 54" pipe on down for prefab. My last 6 years I was a teacher at night teaching pipefitting.
Some days I wish I could still be working. I did prefer the fab shop and teaching over working in the field.