????懷特引述一位高管的抱怨說：“坦白來說，當我身邊沒有人時，我可以在1小時內完成很多工作，就跟我在這一天余下時間所完成的工作一樣多。”

????懷特將這一切統計在內，他稱一周工作時間“總而言之，大約在57-60小時之間。而這顯然是最低限度，如果算上會議、出差、公司緊急情況，那么一周工作時間可以輕而易舉地增加到70或80小時。”

????換句話說，公司高管們總是在抱怨極端的工作。“接受《財富》提問的公司高管一致表示，他們的上級主管高度認同每周工作55小時，如果能達到60小時就更好了，”懷特如是寫道。

????當然，跟當代職員一樣，我們有理由相信，以往那些公司高管夸大了自己的工作時間。從上世紀60年代開始，美國每隔10年左右都會舉行一次大規模的美國人時間支配情況調查（Americans' Use of Time Project），作為該項目的一部分，研究人員會對人們的時間日志和他們估計的一周工作時間進行比較。1965年時，那些認為自己每周工作65-74小時的人實際工作時間只有57.6小時，那些認為自己每周工作55-59小時（懷特認為這是正常的一周工作時間）的人實際工作時間只有42.5小時。來自馬里蘭大學（University of Maryland）的約翰?羅賓遜是上述調查項目的負責人，他提供了2006-2007年的數據，結果顯示那些認為自己每周工作50-59小時的人實際工作時間只有47.3小時，那些聲稱自己每周工作70小時以上的人實際工作時間只有58.8小時。

????高估自己每周的工作時間可謂一個歷史悠久的傳統。

????為什么人們這么執著于夸大自己的工作時間呢？這里面的原因可能跟懷特用來解釋公司高管們為什么辛苦工作的原因是一致的：雄心抱負、從眾心理、以及尋求從工作中塑造人格。1954年的一些人相信，世事必將改變，人們不可能永遠這樣辛苦工作。懷特較為樂觀：“公司高管們口頭上還會繼續說，要變得更加感性些、抽出時間去讀讀那些書、少加點不可理喻的夜間——但實際上他們還是會一切照舊，”懷特寫道，畢竟，“要干的活太多了。”

????譯者：王燦均

????Whyte quotes one executive complaining that "Honestly, in one hour when nobody's around I can get as much work done, real work, as I can during the rest of the day."

????Whyte tallied all this up and declared the workweek to be "all in all, some fifty-seven to sixty hours. And this evidently is a minimum; come convention time, a trip, a company emergency, and the week can easily go to seventy or eighty hours."

????In other words, up and comers have always complained about extreme jobs. "Executives questioned by FORTUNE were unanimous that their superiors approved highly of the fifty-five hour week and liked the sixty-hour week even better," Whyte wrote.

????Of course, just as with modern workers, there's reason to believe that executives from prior generations were overestimating their workweeks. Starting in the 1960s, every 10 years or so, as part of a massive survey known as the Americans' Use of Time Project, researchers compared time diaries subjects kept to their estimated workweeks. In 1965, people who believed they were working 65-74 hours per week turned out to be working 57.6 hours; people who believed they were working 55-59 hours (which Whyte pegged as a normal week) were in fact working 42.5 hours. The University of Maryland's John Robinson, who directed the Americans' Use of Time project, provided numbers for 2006-2007, which found that people who estimated their workweeks at 50-59 hours were actually working 47.3 hours. People who claimed to be working 70-plus hours were working 58.8.

????Overestimating workweeks is a time-honored tradition.

????Why such an obsession with proclaiming long hours? Probably for the same reasons that Whyte listed to explain why his executives worked so hard: ambition, conformity, and drawing one's personal identity from work. Some people in 1954 were convinced things had to change; people couldn't possibly work this hard forever. Whyte was more sanguine: "Executives still will talk of being more sensible, of getting around to those books, of cutting out this ridiculous night work -- and they will keep on doing just what they have been doing," he wrote. After all, "There is too much work to be done."