Elon Musk’s 120-hour work week isn’t just horrifying — it’s dehumanizing
Elon Musk is trying to normalize the 120-hour work week, which is both horrifying and dehumanizing.
Musk has long been known for his extreme workplace ideals. It seems that one of his methods of leading a business is to purge most of its employees before demanding extreme hours from those left standing. When he took over Twitter, he ultimately laid off 80% of staff before telling those remaining that he expected them to work 84-hour weeks, which is 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Musk claims he works 120 hours a week, though it’s unclear how much of that time is spent rage-tweeting, trolling, and being President Donald Trump’s shadow. However, he has been known to sleep in his work offices. If that’s the lifestyle that suits him, that’s fine. The problem is that he’s pushing this lifestyle on his own workers and disparaging those who work the typical 40-hour week.
Elon Musk pushes the outrageous 120-hour work week
Since he started heading DOGE, Musk has repeatedly touted his 120-hour work week. According to him, his DOGE employees are all expected to work 120 hours/week. He also began mocking those who work “only” 40 hours a week and dare to take off weekends, insisting that his extreme work ideals are why DOGE is “winning.” On X, he wrote, “Our bureaucratic opponents optimistically work 40 hours a week. That is why they are losing so fast.” Musk has also taken jabs at those who take weekends off, writing, “Very few in the bureaucracy actually work the weekend, so it’s like the opposing team just leaves the field for 2 days.”
Recently, reports arose that DOGE employees had allegedly transformed federal office space into living quarters. The weird arrangement raises ethical concerns about the government giving free housing to these workers but may also be indicative of Musk’s extreme demands. Squatting in federal buildings makes sense when you work 120 hours a week and don’t want to waste precious free minutes driving home.
On Reddit, users discussed the arrangement, pointing out that the 120-hour work week is essentially “slavery.” It advocates for all work and no life and doesn’t even seem possible. Musk must exaggerate his DOGE staffers’ work week at least a bit. Working 120 hours a week means 17 hours a day, 7 days a week. These workers would have just seven hours a day of free time, which presumably would be mostly spent sleeping. It’s hard to imagine anyone could function on this schedule without experiencing extreme fatigue or low morale. One Redditor suggested he’s just pushing this 120-hour work week to try to mandate “60 – 80” hour work weeks without as much opposition.
Of course, whether he or his workers are working 120 hours, the biggest problem is that he’s trying to normalize this to the public. He’s going on X, jeering at people that they’re “losers” because they work 40 hours a week and take off weekends to take care of themselves and be with their families. In reality, the 40-hour workweek is already outdated. It’s not just that it’s not as productive as one thinks, but also because society is becoming more aware of work-life balance and realizing it’s not a flex to work your life away for a company that doesn’t care about you.
Unfortunately, Republicans have long pushed against work-life balance. They’ve been adamantly opposed to remote work, paid parental leave, sick days, and retirement, striking down basically any flexibility initiatives. People like Musk have pushed for 120-hour work weeks, Matt Walsh has claimed it’s ” embarrassing” to take sick days, and Ben Shapiro has stated that retirement is “stupid.” It has always been perplexing why the party that’s allegedly “pro-life” and is obsessed with the birth rate and people having children are also the ones who rally the hardest to create a toxic workplace culture that doesn’t leave employees any time in the day for themselves, much less for their families.
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