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Working overtime has its pros and cons.
In fact,57% of Americanssaid in 2022 that they wanted to work overtime because of growing expenses.
Con: you risk burnout and health problems as your stress levels might increase.
But sometimes, working overtime can have more advantages than disadvantages, and thats what happened tothis Redditor.
So they decided to maliciously comply with the bosss demand and work overtime and getpaid for doing nothing.
Yet that is what happened to the OP.
And from the OPs story, seems as if there was no extra work and no tight deadline.
One commenter already mentioned a possible reason why OPs boss mightve told his employees to work overtime.
The useru/KeepItMovingFolksobserved that departments in some companies do this so they can avoid budget cuts the next year.
However, it seems that, in this particular case, mandatory work was compulsory for all employees.
Another option is to discipline or demote them.
Using overtime to not get any budget cuts the next year is also mere speculation.
It doesnt exactly explain the bosss irritation at seeing the OPslacking offat their desk.
The OP will get their extra pay for staying late at work.
So its not like the boss tricked them into doing mandatory overtime without extra pay.
However, overall research shows that overtime does not increase productivity.
In 2015, CNBC sharedresearchthat once workers hit the 40-hour-a-week mark, their productivity starts to decline.
Whats more, it takes a sharp dive once workers reach 50 hours a week.
2023 researchfrom the business-to-business marketplace Expert Market shows that increased work hours dont correlate with increased productivity.
Researchers examined workforces in 40 countries and came to this conclusion.
Luxembourg took first place, where employees worked 1,473.3 total hours and earned $96.52 per person per hour.
In the U.S., in contrast, the average salary was $42.18 per person per hour.
But the total hours worked was also significantly higher 1,810.9.
Workers inGermanyworked the fewest hours 1,340.9.
Yet they still produced $47.09 per person per hour.
Check out the results:
