Well, if you ever get the chance to work with highly skilled, well paid workers I think you'll be surprised to find that even we have a hard time estimating the effort needed to complete tasks since we are usually doing unique and complex things that have unknowns. I also suggest studying agile methodologies which assume workers are working at 100% and instead of guaranteeing work gets completed according to estimates it tracks work completed and adjusts accordingly.
estimate and result oriented work are two different things.
Result oriented work is: Here is how much I did this week. I either met, exceeded or fell short of some expectation. The person then decides if this is the place they want to be and the employer decides if they are a good fit.
Agile in most places is a managers whip. I will go so far to say I have never seen it implemented in a way that is beneficial to devs. (possibly by design)
Estimates are even worse... you cant estimate software at scale. spending dollars to pickup dimes as the saying goes.
The problem I see is that without defined boundaries, employees tend to overwork instead of underwork. I see managers praising engineers that work nights or weekends and Managers not encouraging their reports to take enough vacation under 'unlimited vacation' policies. Mgmt is still going to rate you based on your performance but at least having a time off policy prevents a complete race to bottom in the name of productivity.
