San Antonio College Library

Work Time is a sociological overview of the complex web of relations that shapes much of our experience of work and life yet often goes without critical examination. The author examines work time past and present, exploring structural economic change and the gender division of labor, to ask: what are the historical, cultural, public policy, and business sources of current work-time practices? The book focuses on the US in a global context and explores...

Why do Americans work so hard? Are the long hours spent at work really necessary to increase organizational productivity? Leslie A. Perlow documents the worklife of employees who assume that for their own success and the success of their organization they must put in extended hours on the job. Perlow doesn't buy it. She challenges the basic assumption that the more employees work, the better the corporation will do. For nine months, Perlow studied...

Pietro Basso argues that the average working time of wage labourers is more intense, fast-paced, flexible, and longer than at any period in recent history. This is true, he posits, not only in industry and agriculture, but also, and particularly, in the service industry. In this comprehensive survey of all the Western countries, not just the US, he demonstrates that extraordinary work pressure is increasing throughout. The introduction of the thirty-five-hour...