Writers Monthly Supports
Take Back Your Time Day
October 24, 2004
http://www.timeday.org

Join San Diego's Work Less support group! Sign up at: http://workless.meetup.com/

March 2004
PROPOSED PARTY PLATFORM ADDITIONS FROM THE TAKE BACK YOUR TIME DAY CAMPAIGN

http://www.timeday.org

WHEREAS, Americans are the most overworked people in any industrial nation, working nine full weeks more each year than their counterparts in Western Europe, and

WHEREAS by overworking, we are threatening our health, families, relationships, communities, civic life and environment, and

WHEREAS, by working less, we could create more work opportunities for unemployed Americans, and

WHEREAS, working less would leave us more time to take care of our health (reducing health costs!), care for our families and communities, participate in the political process, and be better environmental stewards,

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the Writers Monthly Anti-Social Party advocates the following four-point national legislative program:

I. Make Election Day a national holiday. A poll shows that 62% of Americans agree with this idea that would give us more time to exercise our civic responsibility to vote and call attention to our need to participate in civic life. Other industrial countries make Election Day a holiday or hold elections on weekends.

II. Enact paid Family and Medical Leave as part of the Family and Medical Leave Act. Nearly every other modern industrial nation offers at least six months paid family leave. The US offers no minimum paid family leave.

III. Enact three weeks minimum annual paid leave for all workers, increasing to four weeks after five years in the workforce, and portable. Japan has a three-week minimum while in other industrial countries the minimum is four weeks. The US has no minimum and 26 % of working Americans get no paid vacation.

IV. Enact a cap on mandatory overtime. After 48 hours' work in a week (8 hours overtime) employers could not require additional overtime work. This is already the law in Canada and all of Europe. The US has no law limiting compulsory overtime.

Let's bring the United States up to the standards already in place in all other industrial countries, thereby creating more jobs and improving our health, families, community and civic life and environment!

For more information, contact John de Graaf at 206.443.6747.

February 2004
People in San Diego are forming a Work Less support group! You are welcome to join! Simply go to: http://workless.meetup.com/

You can help more people to Work Less by getting involved in the International Work Less Meetup Day:
1. Tell friends about: http://workless.meetup.com/
2. Post flyers around town: http://workless.meetup.com/flyer/
3. Tell good websites about http://workless.meetup.com/share/
Spread the word! 

For Immediate Release
For more information contact:
David Boyne, Publisher
http://WritersMonthly.com
DavidBoyne@WritersMonthly.com
P. O. Box 4913
San Diego, CA 92164-4913

WritersMonthly.com Presents
TIME DAY HAPPY HOUR-PLUS!
featuring
Joe Robinson, Author of "Work To Live"
And
Suzanne Schweikert M.D., Contributor to the
"Take Back Your Time Day Handbook" and columnist for Writers Monthly (It's About Time)
With
Live Music by Rick Shaw Monkey

Join Us for a Time Day Happy Hour

October 24th, 2003 6:00p.m. – 10:00 p.m.
At Current Affairs Bookstore
2536 University Avenue
619.795.9855
(2 blocks East of Texas Street in North Park, San Diego)

The very first national "Take Back Your Time Day" event is happening soon, and we plan to celebrate! It takes place on October 24th, 2003, chosen because it falls nine weeks before the end of the year, and symbolizing the nine weeks - or 350 hours – more each year that Americans work compared to western Europeans. The scary truth is that medieval peasants worked less (and got more sleep) than we do.

Joe Robinson, nationally recognized author, in his new book, "Work To Live," shares with us an argument for making vacation and free time a priority in America’s future. He also contributed a chapter to the Take Back Your Time Day handbook, called "The Ever Shrinking Vacation." In it, he discusses the many reasons why the average American’s vacation time has been replaced with more work, and along with it our time with our families, our passion for civic activities, and our enjoyment of life.

Suzanne Schweikert M.D. is a San Diego physician who has seen the serious effects of over-work on many of her patients. In her chapter in the Take Back Your Time Day handbook, "An Hour A Day… Could Keep The Doctor Away," she discusses the effects of time stress and overwork on our bodies and our mental health. She encourages her patients, and everyone else wanting a healthier life, to take back their time while they still can.

Come to our "Take Back Your Time Day" event for some fun and entertainment. The only thing we ask you to bring is an answer to the question:

What would you do if you had from October 24th until the end of the year to do whatever you wanted, with no guilt, no pressure, and no financial penalty?

We believe you would do amazing things!
And there is no Time like "Time Day" to start planning for it.

********

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Note: A formatted PDF version of this Press Release is available on the Time Day web site at: http://www.timeday.org/press

PRESS RELEASE-TAKE BACK YOUR TIME DAY CAMPAIGN LAUNCH

For Immediate Release

Contact: Gretchen Burger: 206 293-3772

John de Graaf: 206 443-6747

70th Anniversary of 30-Hour Workweek Bill
Finds Americans Ready to Take Back Their Time

Seventy years ago, believe it or not, the United States Senate overwhelmingly passed a bill that would have made the official U.S. workweek thirty hours-anything more would have been overtime.

On April 6, 2003, the 70th anniversary of that momentous but forgotten event in U.S. history, organizers of a new initiative to fight overwork and time poverty will officially launch the "Take Back Your Time" campaign (www.timeday.org),
leading to a national event organizers call "Take Back Your Time Day," to be held on October 24, 2003.

The More Things Change. . .

The Senate’s goal back in 1933 was to create jobs for the unemployed, while giving workers time for family life, education, recreation and civic participation. Yet in 2003, the National Sleep Foundation reports that a third of all Americans work more than fifty hours each week.

According to the International Labor
Organization, Americans now work 1,978 hours annually, a full 350
hours-nine weeks-more than Western Europeans average. Juliet
Schor, author of "The Overworked American," estimates that the average American now works 199 hours-five weeks-more each year than he or she did thirty years ago.

"Medieval peasants worked less than we do," says Take Back Your Time’s national coordinator John de Graaf, editor of the upcoming book "Take Back Your Time" (Berrett-Koehler Publishers), to be released this summer.

"Don’t get me wrong, Take Back Your Time Day is not anti-work. But the fact is that American life has gotten way out of balance. Americans are working harder than ever as they are forced to sacrifice the things that really matter, like good health and a clean environment, active citizenship and social justice, and time for nature and the soul."

"Time is a family value," adds Bill Doherty, a family therapist at the University of Minnesota and co-author of "Putting Family First." "But now families rarely have time to eat dinner together and even our children are being pushed into schedules that used to be reserved for CEOs. Overwork and over-scheduling are weakening the bonds that hold our families together."

"Earth Day" of Time

Jerome Segal, a professor at the University of Maryland and author of "Graceful Simplicity," hopes that on Friday, October 24th, thousands of Americans will participate in teach-ins and other public events to begin a new national non-partisan dialogue about time poverty and what we can do about it.

"The date falls nine weeks before the end of the year, symbolizing the nine full weeks more we work each year compared to our trans-Atlantic neighbors," he adds. "We see it as being like the first Earth Day, which stirred the consciousness of America about what we were doing to the environment. Take Back Your Time Day could do for our overworked, over-scheduled, overstressed lives what Earth Day did for the planet."

NOTE: We can offer experts around the country for you to speak with, and provide b-roll for television.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - MAY 6, 2003

FROM: TAKE BACK YOUR TIME DAY NATIONAL STEERING COMMITTEE

CONTACT: GRETCHEN BURGER - 206.293.3772, petulia@netzero.net

WHAT AMERICAN MOTHERS REALLY NEED IS MORE TIME

What mothers all across America need most this MotherŽs Day is a respite from their overworked, over-scheduled lives, and a new national campaign is underway to give it to themŠand to all Americans. More mothers with small children are part of the paid U.S. labor force today than ever before. And theyŽre toiling longer hours, according to a recent AFL-CIO survey of working women.

"Two in three working mothersŠ66 percentŠwork 40 or more hours every week, compared with 60 percent of women without children," says the AFL-CIOŽs Karen Nussbaum, former director of the WomenŽs Bureau at the U.S. Department of Labor.

But their need for more time doesnŽt stop there. "When they arenŽt working, AmericaŽs Moms are rushing from place to place to keep up with schedules that only CEOs used to follow," adds Barbara Carlson, co-author of Putting Family First. "They once got some quiet time and a little relaxation while their children were involved in unstructured play. But now the kids are enrolled in activity after activity, hour after hour, and Mom is expected to chauffeur them," says Carlson.

In the meantime, thereŽs really little time left for real family life. "The number of families that eat dinner together has dropped by a third since the late 1970s, and the number of families taking vacations has fallen by 28 percent," says family therapist Bill Doherty of the University of Minnesota. One study found that dual-income couples with kids spend only 12 minutes a day talking to each other. "In all of our talk about family values, we often forget that time may be the most important family value of all," adds Doherty. "It takes time to keep a family together and raise healthy, happy children who will grow up to be good citizens."

Nussbaum, Carlson and Doherty are all active in the "TAKE BACK YOUR TIME DAY," campaign, a new non-partisan national initiative. On October 24, 2003, concerned Americans all across the country will participate in teach-ins and other events to challenge time povertyŠfrom over-work and over-schedulingŠin America. TAKE BACK YOUR TIME DAY falls nine weeks before the end of the year, symbolizing the fact that Americans now work 350 hoursŠnine weeksŠmore each year than Western Europeans do.

"Over-work and over-scheduling threaten our families, health, communities and environment," says Take Back Your Time Day national coordinator John de Graaf. "The goal of Take Back Your Time Day is to get all Americans talking about our lack of time and what we can do to reclaim our frenzied lives. ThereŽs no present like the time."

More information about TAKE BACK YOUR TIME DAY can be found at: www.timeday.org.

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Click here to download a demo (4 meg MP3 file) of the song Take Back Your Time, written and performed by Tim Wang of Rick Shaw Monkey. (A finished version of this song will be on the next Rick Shaw Monkey CD.)

One thing you cannot recycle is wasted time.
-- Anonymous

Enjoy life. There's plenty of time to be dead.
-- Anonymous

If a man should walk in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is danger of being regarded as a loafer, but if he spends his whole day as a speculator, shearing those woods off and making earth bald before her time, he is esteemed an industrious and enterprising citizen.
-- Henry David Thoreau

To laugh often and much;
To win the respect of intelligent people
and the affection of children;
To find the best in others;
To appreciate beauty;
To leave the world a bit better
whether by a healthy child,
a garden patch,
or a redeemed social condition;
To know even one life has breathed easier
because you have lived;
This is to have succeeded.
Ralph Waldo Emerson