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In addition to the 12 hour shift for all, and night shifts being allowed for women, there is still a 48 hour workweek, and maximum overtime of 145 hours in a 3 month period (an average of one extra 12 hour shift per week). Indian employers are required to pay double for overtime, so this seems mostly like the ability to move to 12x4 instead of 8x6. From an Indian minister:

> “Now, the rule is that workers should work for 48 hours and the aim is to reduce work from six days a week to four or five and in a total week, the work still remains at 48 hours. In the case of those working for 10 hours a day, the workers will work for five days a week and those who work for eight hours a day will work for six days a week,” Ashwathnarayan said.

From https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/other/karnataka-passes-bill-a...




This reminds me of when people in China were expected to work on Saturdays back in 1999. Developing countries often require 48 hours a week as a way of catching up.



Ya, it is still common in some tech companies, but it was ubiquitous in 1999. By the time I started working in China (not for Alibaba) in 2007, it was not a mandatory practice anymore. China had changed a lot in just 8 years.


ugh, really gets to me. What the hell is the point of claiming to be the political inheritors of a proletarian revolution if you're gonna treat workers like that?


Jack Ma took some bad rap for promoting it if I remember correctly


A way of "catching up"? Demanding an inhumane amount of work out of people doesn't help those people catch up, it uses up their one and only life to create wealth for a few elites in their country, and shareholders outside their country.


That could be true, but America and Europe did the same thing before they got rich. Isn't it a bit hypocritical to wag our finger at developing countries now for doing the same thing that our countries did?


I think the mistake you're making is implying that bad working conditions are inherent to a poor nation, and good working conditions are inherent to a rich nation, so the ends (good working conditions in the future) justify the means (bad working conditions now). Might it be possible that america becoming rich and america getting better working conditions were not causally related? It seems to me that better working conditions came out of labor organizing, rather than a natural result of wealth increase.


All countries that have gone through development started with bad conditions that got better, not just America. China is proof of that right now. You could just as easily condemn the people you would otherwise want to help to poverty instead.


Can you provide a source for your statement?



and slaves before that and share croppers after slaves.


Even after slavery, the 5/40 didn’t become standard until the 1950s.


It's mainly the country "catching up". One would think development of China helped more than just a "few elites in their country".




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