Are American workers just plain lazy?

You may be right about some of our population but
if we are so incredibly lazy than why do we have perhaps the cleanest, user friendly (amenities/infrastructure/support network) and most desireable country in the world. If you want to stop
the global embarassment put a leash on these so called stars or just kick them out. And another thing
I am sick of MTV cribs. Just keep rubbing the inballance in our faces. Some times I tempted to just quit as well. I'll never have Britney's money,what a complete waste. And another thing could our government be any more obvious about allowing these ridiculously large corporations to suck us dry?
Not in bed together,yeh right.
So, is the land of opportunity still just that or are we the land of a corrupt government fleecing the last of its sheep before the slaughter?
I'll work hard just don't expect me to by this B.S.

There is a difference between working hard and working long hours and that difference can be measured (to some extent) by productivity differences. US workers is far more productive than workers in developing countries and thus can command a higher wage. Furthermore, working longer hours may have a deliterious effect on worker productivity and increase accidents and mistakes. I would rather have workers that work at peak efficiency all the time they are on the job than workers who are inefficiently using their time. That being said, there is something to the observation that the American work ethic isn't what it used to be. When someone fails to put in an honest day's pay, that person really don't deserve the corresponding honest day's wage.

Also, I think that the argument that if Americans spend their free time in front of the TV and engaging in unhealthy eating habits that somehow that is a decline in the quality of life is another example of arrogance among the intelligensia. As Jeremy Bentham observed, "Prejudice apart, the game of push-pin is of equal value with the arts and sciences of music and poetry." You and I may agree that reading and exercise are superior activities to watching reality TV and eating junk food but neither your judgment nor mine should not be imposed upon others.

I don't know what to make of your blog. Our work day has been extended to working at home via the computer and being in constant contact with our office and customers 24-7 via our cell phone. No way am I going to give up my Sunday's to be in the office instead of with my family.

I'm not sure what part of the blog is your material or Fortune magazines but frankly it "must have been a slow news day" for both of you.

I kind of disagree with the whole reading part in this article. Since access to the internet has increased for many Americans a lot of people now read online. Many newspapers now have online websites devoted to the news and other forms of reading. Just because fewer Americans are picking up paper books doesn't mean that Americans are not reading because there are other forms of reading besides published books.

Tell yah what I dont like fat Americans ethier. But my father me and my brothers dont fit that catogory. I also hate working over 40hours/week life is to short to work it away. I would rather work 40 hours /week til the day I die than to work 48+ saving to retire an old man who cant enjoy life. If I am old and broke up I would rather go to work. The best of me is going to enjoy life. If that makes me lazy in your eyes , I realy dont care , I know I give 60 hours of work in 40. So use your pro Chinna spin how you want.

It's about time somebody said this. Political correctness is making us a country of wimps. How did this nation get to be so great? Somebody had to work for it. Think about it.

SOME MAY
BE LAZY , BUT MOST PEOPLE ARE WORKING LIKE SLAVES, 40 YEARS AGO A WOMAN COULD STAY HOME AND THE MAN MADE ENOUGH FOR THE FAMILY TO LIVE ON. THIS SYSTEM IS OUT OF WACK ,LOOK AT ALL THE GREED, YES I SAID GREED, LOOK AT THE PEOPLE LIVING ALL OVER THE WORLD IN POVERTY, WHILE SOME HOGS MAKE MONEY ON OTHER PEOPLES MISERY. JUST LOOK AT 1 CASE ENRON,LOOK AT WHAT THIS DID TO THOUSANDS OF PEOPLES LIVES. THERE ARE A LOT MORE CASES LIKE THIS, MOST AMERICANS ARE NOT LAZY THAT IS A LOAD OF YOU KNOW WHAT. STEVE.

Give me a break! Once again us Americans get bashed through some anti-American propaganda. If I look around where I work, I see Americans busting their tails...and then, they go to their second jobs. The ones that do not perform usually do not stay with us too long.

Do the geniuses (or agitators) who have conducted this so-called study factor in how many of us are on salary? Companies love to do this when they can since once you are on it, it is free overtime from us employees to them. Did they consider that many work for themselves as contractors (so that companies do not have to provide benefits)? I would bet this number is growing.

If you have read the news lately, you will see that our "hard working" Chinese counterparts have provided many disastrous product rejects for our American companies. Oops! I guess no one over there bothered to get into the details of what they are making...or perhaps they did not have the proper training to know better.

As a former field service engineer, I have traveled for my job over the years; I do not see our foreign counterparts working any "harder". In fact, we were over in Germany once, in a facility where our German customers could not hang around after 4:00 P to allow us to finish the job. Then, they complained about how inferior our American components (that had failed in our unit) are, until we showed them that the components were actually made in Germany by a German company.

To respond to the other part of this story: There may be many social reasons why we have gained weight over the years. If I use my own two eyes and memory I would start with the fact that the medium soft drinks at fast food restaurants today are larger than the largest drink sold to us back in the early 70's. An order of large fries today would have fed an entire family back in 1973. Why do fast food joints do this? Because the profit margin on fries and soft drinks is so high, that they can charge us a lot more and make a lot more profit when they give us a larger product. Notice that the burgers (smaller profit margin) have not increased in size; I will bet the fat content in them has! They are essentially increasing their sales by 30 - 50% when they do this; but in fairness, we are stupid for allowing them to. People have been brainwashed into buying fat free, low carb, low cal, low this, free that products with the false sense of security in thinking that they can eat normal or even larger portions. Is this the cause of obesity? It may be the tip of the iceberg. These are among the symptoms of what ails our society. The disease is corporate greed and the exploitation of us. You wait; the disease is spreading worldwide.

Well, have to go. I have to get to work.

I remember it wasn't too long ago that we Americans were freaking out because the Japanese worked much longer hours than us and were taking over our automobile market. Now we work more hours than them and it still isn't good enough apparently. To call Americans lazy because they work less hours then the third world countries that are basically using slave labor practices on their population is ridiculous and a bit scary. This article was clearly written by a person who has no clue or sensitivity to what doing manufacturing work for 60 hours a week feels like. I'd like to see them try it for just one week. Hopefully it would give them a little more insight into what's really going on in the world's work force right now and would spur them to write a more illuminating article. Stop the insanity!!!!!

I used to work 60-70 hours a week (company mandated) but I work a lot less now, since they off-shored my job to India. And we had to train the sons-a-______ before they let us go!! People with 10, 15, 20 years service - gone. Think I'll ever bust my tail for a company again?

I'm a surgical nurse, and work with many surgeons from different countries. They all comment on how hard Americans work. The pace of the workplace was one of the hardest things for them to get used to. The second hardest was being away from their families so much. Welcome to America! I'll take their judgment over the writer anyday!

Just the type of article I woukl expect from Fortune
I agree with the poster who said he lost his job to offshoring and the company had the gall to make him TRAIN his replacement . Big business loves those B1 workers . Especially in the Information Industry . There are plenty of QUALIFIED Americans who can do the jobs but the Companies don't want to PAY them .
Strangely these same companies can NEVER find
Executives from Overseas who would do THEIR jobs for much , much less and who have a track record of outperforming their US counterparts . It is amzing to me that the Guy Home Depot fired got the
top spot at Chrysler . The whole area of CEO compensation is a joke . It's a closed circle where they all sit on the Boards and scrub each others backs . The rules are rigged against the average shareholder and a recent attempt to change that
was unsuccesful .

While we're at it, why not bring back child labor? Everyone knows they're not learning anything in school anyway. And corporations could pay them in games and toys that are too expensive for their hard-working parents to purchase.

And let's close all the fast food chains and force wage slaves to buy sacks of brown rice and tofu at the supermarket and then stop off at the library to pick up some Serious Literature.

Honestly, isn't part of the so-called American Dream the freedom to be a lazy, illiterate, couch potato McSlob, if that's what turns you on?

And for all that, I think many Americans are working harder than ever to keep their underpaid jobs before they're outsourced to workers in India who will be paid even less money.

And since when do longer hours translate into higher efficiency?

30 or 40 years ago, weren't experts predicting that soon Americans wouldn't have to work more than 20 hours/week because of technological advances?

Glad to see so many stand up and respond honestly. I work a salaried position "part time". I work 4 -10 hour days a week. Unless my math is wrong, that's full time hours. I never take a lunch break and it's drop and run from the minute I get there. I'm never done with anything. I called computer support and was on the phone with the tech when I got distracted and said, "sorry, I'm doing 2 things at once" he laughed and said, "this is _____, if you're not doing at least 2 things at once you're not working". If I worked (and got paid for) full time, I'd be working 50 hours a week. Add in the 2 hours travel time each day and that would be the 60 hours you're talking about. Don't think I'm lazy at all. BTW, I don't watch TV, haven't seen a reality show, don't have a house keeper or even a dishwasher, am taking music lessons, read a lot, eat reasonably, work out 5 times a week and I'm still over weight--couch potato? I don't think so.

American workers aren't lazy! The only reason we are losing manufacturing jobs if because of greedy corporations shipping jobs overseas. How about all the problems with the Chinese producks lately. It still comes back to you get what you pay for. I will gladly pay a few extra bucks for a quality, safe product. Oh, by the way I work 50 hours at my job, put in 30 hours in my lawn care business and own rental property which I care for. Hey Geoff Colvin from Fortune come follow me around for a week.

Yea right! This some more govenment propeganda? How many American's actually work 40 hours a week. Lets see my neighboor works a 40 hour a week hob works as a waitress weekends and 2 nights a week just trying to get along. I have lived here 10 years and she has yet to take a week off! My family hasn't taken a vacation in 12 years. Actually I don't know anyone who only works 40 hours a week! My son's girlfriend works 3 jobs One office job 40 hours a week in a office call center after that till 9 pm. on weekends she waitress's at a bar. Oh and she has a B.A in social work but can't find work in that field. Like several of my son's friend 3-with M.B.A.'S and a nephew who graduated with a law degree fron S.U. They would rather hire workers from out of the country for a part of the pay. Manufacturing jobs! Don't make me laugh who can compete with slave labor of China? Our government knew this would happen all along. They want us to lose everything. Look at the laws they have passed lately? No more bankrupsty even on medical ,allowing hospitals to charge whatever they want for a fee to the uninsured. Putting leins on peoples homes for medical bills. While at the same time allowing illegals to come her and get free healthcare and have money enough to send back to their families in Mexico. Now our jobs are on the line with the new Mexican truckers comming in and working for a part of what we get paid. But we need insurance our trucks have to pass inspection,pay road tax's, and income tax, not to mention fines for log books and violations they keep comming up with. We can't fill up Double tanks with cheap fuel in Mexico, We aern't allowed to start keeping a log book when we hit the boarder, No matter how long you have drove before that. We have to actually show up with I.D. for drug test. Mexican's don't have drug testing facilities so their samples will have to be sent to America to be checked. Who ever gives the sample will be the next test. Tickets from what the highway patrol has told me it's to be hands off on Mexican trucks. Now I just heard on the news that Bush signed in Canada a agreement to let the U.N. overrule our government in case of a emergency Like a panaramic bird flu. They are probably brewing up a batch right now. From what I've read only a couple of hundred have died since 2000 from it.
Now honestly what country works harder than American's with our government working against us?

This is such a crock of crap......my husband works roughly 75 to 80 hrs. a week and has been for months, without a day off! But Americans are lazy, right? That's the problem with this world now......employers expect way to much from employees. In the old days, the father worked while the mother stayed home and took care of the children, but now both man and woman work crazy hours like this week in and week out. And you wonder why todays kids are so out of control........it's because no one is home to raise the kids we are too busy working!!!