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Multitasking eats the lunch hour. More people than ever in America are skipping lunch hours and eating at their desks instead.
Employees in Hong Kong’s financial district staged a protest last week because their lunch break of 90 minutes was going to be shortened to only an hour.
Here in the United States, lunch hour is unheard of for many U.S. workers, yet nobody is marching in the streets over it.
Americans don’t seem to have enough time for an actual lunch break. Only 35 percent of employees in this country say they almost always take a lunch break, according to a web survey in 2011 of about 750 respondents by Right Management, an HR consulting firm. Another poll by the company taken in 2010 that surveyed 2,300 found nearly 50 percent of U.S. workers consistently took time off for a midday meal.
“Lunch patterns allow us to infer a few things about the North American workplace; and one thing that we already know is that the pressure for productivity and performance can be relentless,” said Michael Haid, senior vice president of talent management at Right Management. “This pressure is showing up in various ways like our finding that one-in-three employees are very likely now in the habit of taking lunch at their computers and phones and with supervisors and colleagues.”
About 65 percent of employees either eat at their desk or don’t take lunch breaks at all, according to the company’s recent survey.
It’s not just rank and file workers. A study by CareerBuilder found that about 40 percent of corporate executives brownbag their lunches, while only 19 percent eat out at a sit-down restaurant, and 17 percent get fast food.
And it’s women executives who seem most lunch-away-from-the-office adverse. More than half, or 57 percent, of women polled said they brought their lunch from home, compared to 36 percent among their male manager counterparts.
Sure, it looks good if you’re busting your butt to get work done, especially in this tough job market, but not taking time out for a healthy lunch could have far-reaching ramifications.
The lunch hour was always seen as a time to get away from the office or factory floor, and that's what workplace experts say workers need to get the full benefits of a meal break.
It's critical for workers to leave the office for lunch, said career and executive coach Rebecca Weingarten, in order "to clear their heads and gain perspective on what they're working on. Also if you're stumped with a problem, thinking about something else actually helps the brain process and come up with a solution."
And Doug Wright, head of clinical development for European insurance firm Aviva Health, which published a report on workers eating habits late last year, added: “It’s well documented that eating more healthily can improve general wellbeing and life expectancy, so there are countless benefits to adopting this approach in the workplace, It’s also important for people to take a break from their desks where possible as this can help improve both morale and efficiency for employees.”
There are no federal laws mandating lunch breaks. “It’s actually something that’s regulated on a state-by-state basis,” said Marc Mandelman, an employment attorney for Proskauer in New York.
Photoblog: Adios a la siesta? Spain's long lunches under threat
In New York, he explained, “you have to provide at least a half an hour lunch break to employees in most situations. But depending on the industry, there may be different requirements.”
There are 22 states with some sort of meal-break mandates on the books, according to Department of Labor data. See this chart to find out if your state is one of them.
Most white-collar jobs, Mandelman continued, generally provide about an hour for meal breaks.
Even so, that doesn’t mean workers are taking the time to munch in peace.
“I wonder if the reluctance to take a break is an expression of devotion or a negative consequence of the unrelenting pressure some organizations are exerting on their workforces to get more done with fewer resources,” said Haid. “Taking time away from one’s desk for lunch would help reduce tension and boost energy. But our research results might lead us to ask is that still a real option for people now?”
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And this, ladies and gentleman, is a good example of why unions came to be, and why they will, eventually, hopefully rise again one day, when the American worker is tired of being taken advantage of. Trust me, in most cases, the boss has lunch. If he/she works during that lunch is a choice he/she has the luxury of making.
THAT is a crock....
Reality Check, you need to take a look at your name then take a look at the numbers. As union membership has dropped from over half the country to less than one in ten, CEO pay has exploded while benefits have dwindled. It is a direct and obvious correlation.
Alan...1st year Eco major or political science? Your observation is BS. And there has never been a time that half the US was union.
RLM, 32 year old graduate working in the corporate world. That said, you're correct: Over fifty percent of industrial workers were unionized, which was only 35% of the total workforce. I should have worded that more accurately.
As far as my "observation" being BS, it isn't my observation... it's widely known fact.
http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/unionincome.jpg
Clearly demonstrates what happened to the middle class as unions were pushed out. Let's add another line for the top 1% and see how they fared:
http://www.progressivenewsdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/images/cantorchart.png
These aren't opinions or personal observations.
Many places require you to take a lunch break, as mandated by law, you must have 15 minutes break for restroom use every half shift, and if you work 4 hours, must be given at least 30 minutes break. Lunch hour, maybe not, but workplaces tend to give you those breaks. What you do with them is your own, but every place I've worked has pretty much always enforced these rules, or stated them clearly. I just always would delay my lunch break until the end of the day, which was a bend of the rule, but managers didn't mind. You know, so I work all day, leave an hour earlier than my out-to-lunch coworkers.
Work harder, work longer hours, keep your head down, don't ask for a raise EVER. Welcome to capitalist America - let's vote someone into office that will protect these policies!
When I worked in a factory, we had 10.5 hour shifts. We had 30 mins unpaid for lunch and two 15 min paid breaks. You could not take one hour for lunch by using the 15 min breaks. If you didn't have time for lunch, you had to stay the full day and that 30 minutes was still unpaid. The result was people walking off the job for lunch and leaving responsible workers to clean up the mess.
So Alan, you got your "facts" from a progressive source. You might want to re-consider what propaganda they are feeding you. Just because they print it doesn't make it FACT. And they are personal opinions, just presented as fact.
Actually BongoBurn, my union is opposed to my choice to eat my lunch in my office. Yet another reason why I DON'T like my union.
My supervisors are very good to work with. I stay here for lunch and if necessary work through lunch but there's also the other side. When I have a need to leave the office for personal business, there is no question, no argument.
Occasionally a few of us go out to lunch together. We are never back within an hour because that's nearly impossible. The supervisors are okay with that because they know that everything evens out in the end.
RLM, progressives and neocons are bound by the same base ten numerical system and standard line graphs. There's no such thing as a "progressive" line graph and a "neocon" line graph.
Unions are great for preventing employee abuse but they are also reasons many of our companies moved production to countries like, China, India and Malaysia.
We are slowly but surely going back to the sort of economic system that existed in the south 200 years ago. It was propped up by free labor from black slaves who lived their life in the abusive grip of plantation owners that treated them any way they wished. Big business, one little bit at a time, is trying to push us back to that same business model. Slaves with no rights and no pay.
Me - I am taking my lunch break. Also, if I work overtime, I am getting paid for it or you will be hearing from my lawyer and the DOL. I am not lazy. I just refuse to be taken advantage of.
Matt, that actually varies from state to state. In Iowa they can work you 24 hours a day without breaks.
I happen to have had various jobs in various industries. It has been a lot of jobs, not just a few. I can attest to the fact that under no circumstance, taking a reasonable period of time for breaks, such as the standard 2-15 minute breaks/1-30minute lunch for an 8 hour period, ever affected the quality/quantity of the work or performance.
That is, based upon one factor. That factor is maturity of your co-workers. If the fellow employees were mature enough to carry their share of the load, without making up childish stories that they were left with no help; and lacking those dingbats who persistently and neurotically try to prove that they are super-workaholics; sometimes without even the goal of earning a promotion - then everything on the job always went perfectly fine.
We call it lunch minutes. I don't know what this Mandelman cat is talking about. I have never seen a white collar environment that allowed more than 30 minutes for a lunch break.
@Rusty248, I've never had a white collar job that didn't offer at least a 45 minute lunch and most didn't particularly care as long as you got the job done.
It’s well documented that eating lunches away from the office leads to loss of income (& Job)
if you want to take a hour off for lunch, then you should work a additional hour ,to make up for the time you stole from you benevolent employer; people in China do not get a lunch break, slaves did not get a lunch break, why should you a lazy American who pays 40% of what your employer graciously gives you, to the Government's of this country.
If you don't like it, find another job. Based on what I've heard ad nauseum from conservatives, I thought it was dead easy to find another job if you don't like the one you have.
White collar here... most of us are taking 45 to 60 minutes. Employer cares about results, not where we spend each minute.
I've only worked in white collar jobs and every place I've worked has had a at LEAST 30 minutes for lunch, but they do require you to work a full eight hours (which seems reasonable to me). I'm at a place now that allows one hour, which is nice. But I eat lunch at my desk most days so I can spend that extra hour at home.
If you don't get at least an hour for lunch, fire your employer. Because he's just so stupid he'll fire you for nothing, anyway.
Matt and Daisy- that is the main reason. People chose to go home earlier to avoid the commute and so on. I was hourly paid but my manager insisted on us doing work lunches til I reminded him I was not salaried and that if I did company business during lunch he would either have to pay me for that hour or let me leave early. Iwasn't popular with management.
I've only worked white collar, salaried positions since graduation. I've always had 1hr for lunch. Whether I took lunch at my desk, or out, I was docked an hour a day for lunch. There's been no such thing as getting to leave an hour early because I didn't take a lunch break. But my lunches have also typically been a bit flexible, since I was salaried. If I took an extra 15minutes, it didn't matter as long as I put my time in and I was productive.
Whether or not you bring lunch from home or buy it is a totally separate issue than whether you leave you desk to eat or not. People can bring food from home and still go outside or somewhere to eat, perhaps reading a book, etc. Or, people can buy a lunch and still bring it back to their desk and eat while working. I don't understand why the stats about how many brown-bag it were included in this article.
People (especially women) who bring lunch from home in my office usually do it because it's healthier and cheaper. We also often eat at our desk while clocked out as we don't have a break room in our section of the building. They need to separate it out to 'do you take a lunch break' or 'do you force down your food while working'.
Not necessarily. where I work if you're sitting in a visible location, at your desk, in the lunchroom, or even outside the building people still come to me to get their problems solved immediately.
And because my boss eats lunch at his desk every day I'm expected to as well.
I pack my lunch & eat it at my desk to be healthier. I'd rather do that then pay 8 dollars for lunch anywhere else. I always make sure to take a break, though. I'll put in my earplugs and catch up on hulu.
Cathy, I was thinking the same thing. Why are they mixing these 2 things, which are by no means 100% correlated ?
Sometimes I work away from my desk, out on site. Those times, I may take a lunch break, or somebody may go buy me lunch (on company account) and bring it back to me (most of those times, it's technically been supper, but whatever). Sometimes, I just have to pick something up on the road and eat while driving (I know, bad habit, but so is working on low blood sugar).
When I'm in the office, I usually take 45-70 minutes for lunch, depending on how much I have to get done. But, sometimes people call me and I have to rush back without even finishing my food. It's hit or miss, mostly hit, though.
Unless I leave the property completely, it doesn't matter where I sit for lunch. "I know your at lunch, but...." Oh yeh, did I mention that I don't get paid for my lunch break?
often,
This is why I leave the property. Even if it is just to eat in my car.
@Severed
Not necessarily. where I work if you're sitting in a visible location, at your desk, in the lunchroom, or even outside the building people still come to me to get their problems solved immediately.
And because my boss eats lunch at his desk every day I'm expected to as well.
I can definitely relate to that. I work in a semi support position and have people ask me for help on my lunch hour (I've even gone so far as to make an "Out to Lunch" sign clearly indicating I am not available) I usually tell them to go pound sand. They now have learned to wait until my lunch break is over.
Chuck, I wish I could get away with that, but my boss is one of those obsessive types who will do anything, and I mean anything, to make people happy. So it falls to me to make that happen.
Problem is that he doesn't have a clue what is or isn't possible.
I don't think the article is about lunch so much as it's about micromanagement in today's work environments. Even executives are watching clocked time. Its so stupid. If you're going to hire someone to do a job why not just trust that job will get done and what does it matter what they do once the work is done? Micromanagement is for overcompensating tools with no real management skills, or people skills for that matter.
Micromanagement is for overcompensating tools with no real management skills, or people skills for that matter.
That describes the "new or improved" me first boss these days.
Remember, the definition of "BOSS" is the word spelled backwards.
Double S-O-B!
Praziain - first, sorry about your Packers, but since I have the Giants in my office pool, not too much.
I believe you are correct. With the push to do more with less, the appearance of working extra hard is often seen as more important than what is actually getting done.
As an example, in a former job, I would always be in the office about 2 hours before anyone else. Since I was an early riser and do my best first thing in the morning, it was advantageous to both me and the company. But since my boss didn't usually start until around 9:00 and didn't leave until 6:00 at night, I was seen as not putting in as much work time.
Unfortunately, perception is reality in many cases.
Question about the photo at the top: How many size 6 ladies eat five half-sandwiches for lunch?
Maybe that's her weeks supply?
If you work out after work like I do, thats pretty small. Gotta have enough food to create enough energy to keep going!
In Texas, the employers can cancel your luch anytime they feel a need to do so. The only requirement is that they feed you and you get 2 fifteen minute breaks in an 8 hour day. It's fun living in a Rep state......YeeHaw
Texas is a right to work state, if you don't like it, (or you job) leave
Nobody except texicans really shive a git about texass.
You say the employer is required to feed you? - sounds like a liberal nanny-culture - never heard of employers being required to feed the employees, except for the military.
And that requirement for two 15-minute breaks sounds pretty liberal also.
jw101, I assume you realize that the real reason that Texas employers can cancel your lunch break is because of the absence of any Texas legislation controlling, the law reverts to the Federal statutes: http://www.dol.gov/compliance/topics/wages-other-breaks.htm
So instead of directing your feigned anger at your GOP controlled state, direct it at your Federal government.
I'm not angry, as much as amazed at this treatment. I'm not an illegal immigrant, I don't like being abused so Master can make a couple of extra pennies.
Get used to it. It's the coming thing.
Therefore, then the up and coming thing for children in disadvantaged children.
Try a government job. These slugs take an hour and a half to two hours for lunch and end up bringing food back to the office to eat. The office reeks from the odor of fried chicken and fish.
Frank Gruden, your a low life liar.
hey frank you suck, your attitude sucks, and your overtures are borderline racist. Citizens buy into this b.s. out of jealousy, corpororate propaganda and fear; jealousy because unionized workers have contracts that protect their rights to some degree. corporate propaganda uses this jealousy to say look at those lazy union workers with their lunch 1/2 hour and 15 min. breaks while you work for your money. And fear that anyone who says anything about how their treated or how their supposed to be treated becomes the target of threats or outright dismissal in some cases Workers should be grateful their are unions especially in prevailing wage states where union wages allow those not in unions to earn a better wage
Sorry, ac, but you read racism into that because you want to. You are assuming that only blacks eat fried chicken. Maybe Frank works in a city that is famous for fried chicken and thus it is prevelant.
bookem danno you may be correct but in which city is this prevalent and why not burgers and fries, these are code words that mask the true intent of the writer. Funny thing is I never mentioned blacks so you infered the same thing proving my point. BY the way I don't assume only blacks eat fried chicken.
I inferred you meant blacks because that is the only group of people for whom eating fried chicken is stereotyped. Therefore your supposition of racism, in my opinion, was based on that particular comment.
How about Louisville, KY as a city where fried chicken is prevalent?
I'll revise my statement that you assume only blacks eat fried chicken is eaten mostly by blacks.
Frank Gruden: I work a "government" job and very few of my co-workers even bother taking lunch breaks. Most of us just sit at our desks and work through it. Then again, we're not paper pushers, we're "do-ers." You know, the whole "stewardship of the nuclear stockpile" being our mission and all...
Frank: I work in a local government job and its a very rare day that I don't work through my lunch. I'm in IT.
You are all right. Some government workers walk around all day doing nothing. Others work their fingers to the bone. Many are doing most of their job. I have perceived that when whole departments have little to do, they do not seem to want the overworked departments to know much about them.
Even in unionized environments such as hospitals, the union has only negotiated a 30 minute meal time, NOT a "lunch hour". We have to pay for this meal time too, by not counting it toward our work time even though most of us simply work through the 30 minutes while eating. You can't go anywhere in 30 minutes to have a meal at a restaurant, for example, so why bother?
kkor, the reason to bother is that no matter the job - even a driver benefits from stepping out and away from the driver seat that they are in all day and it is beneficial to the health to do so for even a few minutes a day.
Incidentally, it has been proven that those in classes or studying increase their memory by taking a small break every 1.5-2 hours.
Frank - Correction (you are)
I have a mandatory 45 minute lunch break at my company. If someone chooses to work through their lunch then they are volunteering their time without pay.
Be careful - if you are subject to federal FLSA rules, the employees can come back at you with a big retroactive "suffer and permit" overtime claim. There may be states with fair labor standards that require OT pay also.
An employer who suffers and permits employees to work extra hours can be on the hook for whopping big settlements. If the employees are hanging around the work area during non-scheduled hours, and the employer allows this, the employer will need to prove that they were not working, when the claim is investigated. Even if the employees volunteer to do it, with no encouragement from the employer, FLSA requires that they be paid for all hours they were permitted to work.
Thanks for the advice. I am aware of those rules and that is why our lunch break is mandatory. It is spelled out as such in the employee handbook and each employee must sign that they understand all of the rules when they are hired. I was being sarcastic when I said they would be volunteering.
Correct, mailman. Then this becomes a performance issue. If you, as a company, require a non-exempt (hourly) employee to take a lunch break and they don't, you cannot just simply take away their pay for that time. You must pay them or risk a lawsuit. Therefore, if someone if violating the company policy, managment must address this from a performance/policy standpoint.
Wow, I need to talk to a lawyer.
The large corporation where I work in the Montana-Dakota region that supplies natural gas, but I won't name them, is covered by a negotiated union contract. Management takes great delight in seeing just how far they can push the employees, and just how much of the contract they can ignore. Lunch breaks are non-existent. It is common to be forced to work one-half to one hour early in the morning, through your required lunch break, and then one-half to one hour late at evening. That is anywhere from one and a half to two and one half hours of unpaid overtime worked by thousands of employees. That is a lot of cost free productivity! Bigger bonus for the guy in the "Ivory Tower". Local management has made the statements, "If you don't like it, LEAVE! There are fifty other people who will be wanting your job," and my favorite to have recorded personally when a manager was asked if the company was breaking the law, "Yes, but there isn't an employee STUPID enough to ever say anything about it!"
So employees, do your jobs, unlike your government SAVE SAVE SAVE and then spend less than you make. Then you will have the power, because you can make the choice to either put up with asinine employers, or move on to something you really enjoy.
Or when you are fed up with working there, you can hire a contingency attorney to file a claim under the Fair Labor Standards Act - not for contract violations, but for "suffer and permit" workhours.
If this is happening, why not contact an attorney now, unless you are an exempt (salaried) employee for whom there is not such a thing as overtime.
A 90 minute lunch break???? The last time they had a protest they climbed to the top of their building and threatened to jump off. Are these people going to do that as well?
It used to be that employers paid their associates lunch breaks. Then that hour was cut to 45 to 30 minutes. Then they realized they could screw their people and not give a rats azz for the associates hard work and dedication by not paying their lunch breaks. (It's all about the money)
17+ years of 12-14 hour shifts. If I had an 8hr job now, 30 minutes and I'd be good to go all day.
We have an hour for lunch, but I normally stay in because I'm too busy to go out. I wish that if I stay in for lunch then I'd be able to get off one hour earlier. But, no. Employers are slave drivers and expect us to work more for less. Just like how many people aren't away whether or not they are supposed to be paid salary/exempt or salary/non-exempt. I've read that a majority of employees in a company should be salary/non-exempt. Many aren't classified correctly under the employment laws. So, needless to say, many of us are being jipped out of our "overtime" pay. Look it up. Salary/non-exempt (overtime pay) is dependent on your ACTUAL job responsibilities and not your job title. Many employees aren't aware of this and that' unfortunate.
Employers need to stop taking advantage of us and allow us to catch a breather.
That depends on what state you're in,it varies.
California uses that standard a lot of others don't.
In California the rules for overtime canchange with the next election. You get overtime after 8 hrs. Then another party controls the legislature and you have to have over 40 to get overtime. Then you work 10 hrs. for 4 days but alas they always need you on the 5th day any way so you get OT for that and then people start taking stimulents to do 4-6 hrs. on Saturday. The money is fine but you do it mostly because you want to be a team player.
Do not forget that most energy drinks are dangerous. Sobe is safe, as are some sold at health food stores.
My employer rightfully does not allow eating at your desk. We have a break room for meals to avoid the filthy greasy crap people who eat at their desks seem to accumulate. One study I read showed that there is aa much harmful bacteria on a keyboard used by someone who eats there as there is on a public restroom toilet!
People who eat at their desks are nest foulers. Don't eat where you work, don't poo where you sleep.
I thought the saying was, "Don't poop where you eat."
Dave2 - In an office I worked at years ago, someone had left a bunch of discarded peanut shells (in behind a keyboard) right on the desk and didn't bother to clean it up. This was in an office where we didn't have our own personal work stations and had to take whichever spots were open/available at the start of our shifts.
One other instance was someone's nail-clippings scattered about the keyboard area. I still cannot fathom why an adult in any workplace could be so utterly inconsiderate. I loved getting outside during my breaks and it helped to refresh my perspective.
I spent 18 years at a retail job. In the beginning I was happy to work 80 hours a week, eating lunch in 5 minutes. The money was good. Big companies now don't care about the people, their health and so on. All the higher-rectums want is money. To them it's all about the almighty dollar.
Greed works both ways. I had a bookkeeper that would graze all morning on snacks and then she would "work" through lunch. I put up with it until she started demanding to get off work early since she didn't take a lunch break. When she started paying herself overtime she was dismissed.
Gee Tiva...it sounds like its about the almighty dollar to you also.
Lol. Higher-rectums, love it.
The 2 hour three martini lunch is still going strong.
If the data about brown-bagging are correct, the restaurants around the office buildings must be taking a big hit. The martini lunches must be limited to a few hardcore-alcoholic executives.
where?
You should be able to drink 3 martinis in an hour,after all it's only 4.5 ounces of gin with a .5 ounce of vermouth.
There is no such thing as a break, much less lunch, if you are a nurse.
So true, I give you all my respect and admiration.
Thank you.
So you're saying that the whole time you spend at work, you don't find time to eat ?
I usually grab something I can eat in 2-3 minutes on the run.
It is apparent that you have never worked on a busy hospital floor.
Sitting down for half an hour would mean staying over another half an hour at the end of the shift to get my charting done.
Tina-293371, you offer a primary example of the sort of place that is too jippy to just hire enough workers. Scheduling is the only problem causing what you state.
I have people in at 9.15, out at 4.45 and take an ENTIRE hour EVERY SINGLE DAY, regardless of what is going on, then whine they don't make enough.
You want more...give more.
A job is not an entitlement (no matter what OWS and bam-bam think). The people that give more, get more. And don't feed me BS about abusing workers. Even athletes have clauses that pay off for certain levels of achievement (such as 70 steriod feuled home runs). I NEVER hear anyone complain about that.
Don't like it? Live in the forest.
FEH!
Reality Check: I'd love to live in the forest!!! Got one in mind?
You are clearly detached from reality...but I'm sure your personal dimentia is alot of fun. Employee / employer dynamic is supposed to be a win - win relationship, not who can get more from which party. More often than not ... the people of give more, simply give more for no reward. I'd even posit that they get taken advantage of.
See that's exactly what a modern day Scrooge would say. But then even he discovered other values.
You're too caught up in the quantity of time. It is how effective you utilize the time you do have. Why would you care how early or how late someone stays as long as they accomplish the workload for the day.
People that give more get more ??? Not necessarily. As you move up in responsibility and senority, you literally do less and often can leave earlier, take more vacations, etc. and still get paid more for less.
After I bought out my partners portion of the small web design company I now own, I changed the work policy. While it's a small workforce of developers, 23 to be exact, I have found that giving them complete autonomy over their work life has increased production and promoted a healthy work-life balance. My employees come and go as they please, with a majority working from home. Some come in at 10am and leave at 3pm. Then they may continue their work around 9pm, after their kids are asleep, maybe another 2 hours. A couple hours here an there on the weekend if they feel it's necessary. When I tally up total work hours, nearly all of my employees work 40 hours or over. But they have the freedom to do it when they want to.
Deadlines are set, and only in rare circumstances are they not met. In the 2 years that I've taken over, I've had zero attrition, and have hired more people.
You said it yourself, "You want more...give more."
The door swings both ways on this one. Simply because you provide someone with a job, doesn't mean the buck stops there. Obviously my circumstances are going to be different than yours considering the business I'm in. I require quality work from my employees, and more often than not demand that specific changes be made to fit our clients needs. I'm upfront about our policy, and anyone who is seen to abuse it will be fired. Period.
You get an hour for lunch?!?! Wow must be nice. Everyone in this neck of the beltway gets 30 minutes.