Nothing says they have a successful AI product as much as needing your staff to work 70 hour weeks. Shouldn't AI startups be advertising how their staff are so efficient they only work 10 hours a week but do their full performance?
this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2026
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The irony is that yet a serious study has to state that those working hours even make sense productivity wise. Usually people get tired, burned out and make more mistakes...
No no. Not mistakes. I've worked jobs where the boss wanted 16 hours a day.
I'd just not give a shit about quality. I worked at a hotel. Plenty of people got free rooms when I worked there. But I also made sure the important things got done.
But were those free rooms a mistake? No. Far from it. They were an intentional middle finger to the millionaire owner who looked down at everyone else.
Then he tried screwing me out of hours I worked. This after working there for 6 years. So I when I asked about it, he was adament that he wasn't going to pay that money.
So I opened a voice recorder on my phone, and had that same exact conversation again.
I made sure to mention that I already worked those hours, but hadn't been paid. To which he said he would never pay for those hours.
That's when I walked to my locker, cleared it out, and left. Then I called the IRS and sent them the file.
Within 2 years the city took his land, demolished his hotel, and now it's an empty field.
What's even worse for him is that this happened in 2018. Right now, the Cleveland Browns are in the process of buying land to build a new stadium in Brookpark (suburb of Cleveland). If he had still owned the land, the Browns would have had to make him an offer he couldn't refuse. He could have sold EASILY for 20 million. He only bought the hotel for 1 million (which is pennies on the dollar for what hotels are worth).
He bought it for around 1 million, and in the 3 years he owned it, only made about 600k on the property.
Which means instead of selling in 2025 for 20 million minimum, plus the business of the hotel from 2018-2025 he would have had by still running the hotel, he instead LOST 400k iN 2018 by having the government forcibly take his land.
All in all, I figure I cost him 20-25 million dollars because he refused to pay something rediculously low like $600. All because I was tired, pissed off, and done with his penny pinching to make me work everyday doubles. That way he wouldn't need to hire more people.
These positions are also typically salaried so they can claim they don't need to pay OT.
No.
You see? The work-week is 40 hour. Anything after that is a no go for me unless extreme cases happen. In fact, we have laws here limiting the number of extra hours that can be done a year to 200-something. I'd run out of extra hours for the year in a month.
In fact, the correct approach is to ask your employees why are they doing overtime. My boss will ask why I stayed for later than my shift if I do overtime. Not because it's a bad thing, but because, if I do on a regular basis, it means we are understaffed and he needs to hire someone else.
But I realize I live in a developed country, with rights and all that socialist stuff.
I'll go live in the deep wilderness before I work 72 hour weeks.
Not joking.
If I'm going to work non-stop I'm going to have a view and total freedom while I do it.
Aren't there studies that say that we aren't really productive after 6 hours per day?
Yes, but have you considered the optics of saying we're working 72 hour weeks on these issues?
The website belongs to Rilla, a New York-based tech business which sells AI-based systems that allow employers to monitor sales representatives when they are out and about, interacting with clients.
Gross.
Nah. I'm ~40 hours a week (very rare overtime) + an on-call rotation about once a month (zero calls in months) + fully remote except for a couple events a year (though I'm welcome to go to the office more). Even if I make ~50% of whatever they're paying, that's still fine with me. I worked my ass off, including multiple jobs, when I was younger.
I guess the asterisk here is that I did start my own farm business on a small farm, but that's also monetizing a hobby.
That's only a 3 day work week if you work those 72 hours all in a row. /s
Nobody sane is excited about working 70+ hour weeks, you vile bastards.
In person too? Why? It’s all computer based. I bet that office has a nice smell of B.O.
And this is what the rich want.
A subdued slave population that will barely have enough to survive whilst they thrive in riches
Wealth caps, NOW
Any wealth and income over a million dollar? 100% to taxes. No more millionaires, no more people hoarding riches. Governments will again have the money so that it can be used for free healthcare, free education, you name it
I'm a bit burnt out and have ADHD so it only works if I have a gun to my head and I can't do it consistently, but essentially if I worked these 72 hour weeks for 2 or 3 years straight, I could actually buy a very nice home with no loan whatsoever.
But that's because I contract through my own company for a pretty decent hourly rate. Reality is I'm working more like 70 hours a month since about May lol
Overtime rules are 50% wage after 40 hours except for management (based on job duties, not whether or not you're salaried) and certain professions paid at least a certain wage.
996 is a 72 hour week, so 32 of overtime being paid at time-and-a-half. Which means 48 pay-hours, on top of the regular 40 means... Uh.... Eww.
I think I'll just skip to the end and assume anyone advocating 996 is a racist dirtbag, thank you very much. (In addition to being an exploitive bootlicker...)
I don’t think it’s racist. That’s probably just a coincidence. But it’s definitely stupid and I guarantee you they don’t pay overtime. I don’t think you’re required to pay overtime for salaried employees.
The “correct” word for salary is usually “exempt employee”, as in exempt for overtime pay.
This isn’t always a bad thing. Some jobs need exempt employees because they run on call rotations and so forth, and if your employer isn’t a dickhead it can genuinely be done fairly with highly flexible hours and pay to match.
Of course, dickhead employers are a dime a dozen…
Some jobs need exempt employees
I disagree. You work X hours, you get paid for X hours. Would the company do any work for free for its costumers? I'm sure every hour of work will be billed.
I’m an exempt employee. I wouldn't trade back.
As with all things, needs are subjective. Sometimes I have to work at 2am because something breaks, and that sucks.
But not needing to worry about how many hours I’m going to be at my desk this week because any change might tank my paycheck is extremely valuable to me. I can take my kids to the doctor without missing pay, or to one of their school events, or take an afternoon off to do something fun, or just get the flu and be out for two weeks without worrying about the mortgage.
Sorry you have had shit experiences, but the world doesn’t exist only at the polar extremes.
Some jobs need exempt employees because they run on call rotations and so forth,
Being on call with highly flexible hours absolutely is not sufficient to make you federally exempt. There are only three things:
- You're a bonna fide manager of the organization empowered to sets the schedule and can hire additional staff as needed.
- You work in a specifically exempted profession, regardless of schedule.
- Your non-overtime compensation puts you over a specific dollar amount threshold.
And, as with most things, your state may have stricter rules. You may also have an employment agreement that grants overtime even if you would be otherwise exempt. But as with the rest of the minimum wage, the federal rule sets a floor that your employer can't go under without risking you suing them for stolen wages.
Not everyone lives where you do and labor laws are complex and varied. Which is why I didn’t go into specifics.
Have fun with that pedantry though.
If we ignore setting and presume an international audience, then it makes sense to also ignore the minimums in laws and reduce it to base principles. Which makes grind culture even worse.
If you regularly work more than 40 hours a week you are being exploited. Regardless of your profession, wage, ownership stake, or what claims your local laws would let you pursue.
This extends very nicely to monthly and annual labor statistics. 72 hour weeks for certain irregular situations like "bringing in the harvest" may not be exploitive, so long as the ratio of hours worked to hours elapsed drops beneath 24%. (5/7/3).
If you’re going to move the goalpost can you at least move it past my “dickhead employers are a dime a dozen…” initial statement?
Notably, IT salaried employees are exempt from overtime. This is in federal law, IIRC.
There's nothing like going to the gym for free after a chillaxed 14 hour work day.
Nope no way. I work alternating 3 and 4 day weeks of 12 hour shifts and I prefer that. I love having 4 days off. It makes it easy to take a nice small trip without taking time off or just relax. I've worked overtime up to 6 days a week plenty of times (at my choice, rarely because the company asked) and its doable but miserable. 12 hour days leaves little time to get stuff done before or after work, so the only chores that get done are put some dishes in the washer or take out the trash. So that leaves 1 day to do a bunch of stuff, cook, clean, go to ths store etc. Usually by day 6 I'm in a rythm and with one day off that can carry over, but the weekend after that I'm just dead. Still its nice to have the option if you want to save up for a trip or something or have a big expense and don't want to dip into savings. If it were my normal schedule or the company ever asked me to do that regularly, I'd be gone in an instant.
Just wait until AI will take most of these jobs. Then the rest can finally work 100+ hour a week. Yeah bro!