Well, lack of sleep causes epilepsy seizures. Not to mention a bunch of other health problems in people who don't have epilepsy.
It's ridiculous to expect people to work this long, and saying people choose to be put in the situation is just irrelevant. We have workers rights for a reason. All of the people who have died doing manual labor over the last 1000 years 'chose' to be in that position as well but that didn't stop us putting in protections for them. Doesn't mean people don't do dangerous shit we just make sure they're well trained, aware of the dangers, given the best safety possible and not forced to do things that are gratuitously dangerous. That happens in the army too. It definitely doesn't happen in IB.
I don't know a single McKinsey consultant who regularly pulls 100+ hour weeks. Those are definitely an exception in MC. 80 hours maybe, but definitely not over 100 regularly if you're not in IBD.
Startup founders worth their salt? I doubt that too. I just don't think 100+ is productive. Pulling 3 all nighters in a row is just ridiculous. You need to get a sense for the difference between even 4 hours sleep (which is really not enough to be near productive) and 0 hours sleep (which just ruins a person).
Nobody's saying people shouldn't work 80 hour weeks, there just has to be limits in place. Nobody's asking for a 40 hour a week cap, just don't make someone work 3 all nighters, simple.
You're mistaken on workers rights being a response to asymmetric information, it's a response to asymmetry in power. However, whether or not an IB worker's power position is exploitive is more arguable.
You don't need any all-nighters to pull 100 hours a week. Live next to the office, work while you eat, take 2 hours off and sleep 8 hours a day - work the rest, and you're at 100 hours.
I'm saying people shouldn't work 80-hour weeks. I'm asking for a 30 hour a week cap. The data is pretty clear that your judgment starts going downhill after that, and much faster than you subjectively think it does, and as you say, the data is also pretty clear that this area is a market failure.
>If somebody chooses to literally work themselves to death, that's their own damn fault
You need to read up on employment law. The Employer/Employee relationship is more complex than a contracting agreement. By law, (at least in my jurisdiction) the employer is legally liable for on the job injuries. (there are some exceptions, depending on jurisdiction.) But generally speaking, if one of my guys tries to lift a server he can't handle and ends up crushing his foot? that's my problem. Of course, I'm insured against that (in my jurisdiction, not having workers compensation insurance is a criminal offense)
I mean, I have had guys who won't wear earplugs, and will use ladders that are breaking. Most employees will do moderately dangerous things if you let them. I think that giving the employer a financial reason to say 'no, throw out that broken ladder and buy one that isn't broken' is a good thing, personally, but good thing or not, it is the law.
This is a huge deal for construction companies, and the primary reason why there is such an emphasis on safety in construction. This insurance is a huge portion of the cost of a construction worker. Workman's comp for desk workers is... a trivially small amount of money, and most of my folks have been desk workers most of the time.
Now, I don't know if the death was related to work or not... but if it was related? legally (and personally, I think ethically) the employer is certainly liable.
> And that's bullshit because in each of these cases, the person CHOSE to be there and CHOSE to undertake those risks. That doesn't mean we have the right to regulate what they choose to endure.
I'm honestly flabbergasted at your response. Your profile says you have been a program manager at Microsoft. I can't imagine you're stupid, how can you have such a naive view of people?
For someone fresh out of college, in a highly competitive environment (IB is more competitive than anything you've likely ever done), there is huge pressure to perform and succeed. You really expect a young kid to make rational choices about his well-being in that sort of situation?
You're right, my comment was extreme and definitely naive and not ubiquitously true. I was simply suggesting that we not place sole responsibility of that on his employer.
I've deleted my original post because in hindsight I feel that it was disrespectful.
If you have a work environment that only kills the marginal...then you have a work environment that kills the marginal. You need to start thinking about physical requirements and medical examinations before hiring, much like the military. Or maybe you need to think about putting a stop to a system that is really about hazing instead of getting stuff done.
The second might improve other things about the efficiency of your business as well. That will have economic consequences not just to you and your employees, and is therefore a thing of proper public scrutiny.
For every Wall Street banker working 100+ hours a week, there is a startup founder on Hacker News that also works for 100+ hours a week.
Who's providing more value is up for debate (I'm inclined to side with the founder of a tech startup :) ), but it's bullshit to chide only one industry for putting too much pressure on employees.
I was a Google intern, and I had plenty of colleagues (including myself) that put in 100+ hour weeks. And that was no one's choice but our own.
If the argument is that quasi-mandatory long hours in tech should also be scrutinized, fully agree. Working hours in the game industry, one of the areas where it's most prevalent, have been getting some scrutiny for the past 4-5 years, and I believe the tide is slowly turning there.
There's a big difference in expectation though. Sure, you CAN put in 100 hour weeks at lots of companies, but at IBanks you're admired for it [and mocked/disrespected/sabotaged if you don't]. I have a lot of friends in banking internships, and whenever I manage to pull one to dinner at 9pm on a friday night they tell me "I had to take so much shit to make it to this!"
Just look at all the press (and the initial forum threads) around this death; notice how everyone's describing him as "one of BAML's best interns"? Why do you think they called him that? Because of the quality of his work, or because of the hours he pulled? I'll give you a hint: IBanking work, at least at the intern level, is really easy.
I don't think there's anything inherently awful about 100+ hour work weeks (in that I would never want to do them, but people know what they're getting into when they join a BAML internship), but anecdotally the culture of working long hours at an IB is much more destructive than, say, working long hours at a hospital -- there's a much more pervasive drug life, and the long hours are borne much more out of showmanship and capriciousness than actual necessity.
It's a pretty shitty industry that attract specific personalities, but it's not going to go away anytime soon -- mainly because of the massive amounts of money.
> Most articles I've read say he had epilepsy. If that's the case, he could have had a fatal seizure in the shower on any given day, regardless of work schedule.
Uhh no.
> Sleep deprivation is the second most common trigger of [epileptic] seizures. In some cases, it has been responsible for the only seizure a person ever suffers
Usually the first time you realise you have a form of epilepsy like Juvenile myoclonic epilepsy is when you pull an all nighter in college (perfect hat trick of bad lighting, drinking and sleep deprivation at the age when symptoms are likely to first appear).
What just seems like clumsiness or aloofness in your personality develops into traditional seizures.
How is it voluntary if everyone else is pulling crazy hours and you need to keep up (or pull ahead) to stand a chance of making the jump from Intern to Real Employee?
Directly from the article:
“Sure, you may not be achieving much by midnight, but do you really want to be one of the first in the team to leave your desk?” George Herbert at PolicyMic asks. “If you’re always the one who leaves first will your boss question your commitment when it comes to calculating your annual bonus or deciding whether to take you onto a regular contract?”
