how many hours is safe to work until your health is at risk?

fitnessguy1

basically i want to increase my income so have been looking into getting another job.

i already work 40 hours at the moment, so if i was to work another job for say 20+ hours, maybe on weekends or evenings, would i be at risk of overworking myself?

i would only want to do this short term for 9-12 months as i am aiming to save a large chunk of money in this time so i can invest.

has anyone here worked 60+ hours per week and were you able to function okay or did it take it's toll on your health?

torbrex

If the second job is completely different to the first then you should not have a problem once the initial burst of tiredness has worn off.

I did 4 jobs at one point in my life all at the same time and it was actually a joy to switch from one to another as it was so different

ThemeOne

It depends on so many things, your general state of health and energy levels, how much you enjoy the jobs etc.

If you're generally quite a tired feeling person and find both jobs dull, then yes you probably will feel overworked.

However, I did two jobs for quite a few years in my 20s. I had my normal 9-5 job, then two or three evenings a week, I did another job 6-11pm.

The original motivation was to get extra money, but I went on doing both long after that no longer applied. I don't recall ever feeling particularly tired, but of course you don't in your 20s!

Gingernutty

I did this for a while.

I eventually gave up the job I quite enjoyed, went with the one which paid the most money and now hate every moment here.

Anyhoo...

As long as you can see an end date or a target (savings/debt reduction) it won't be so bad.

If there's no plan, just work, work, work, then it becomes soul destroying.

I often worked 70 hour weeks in total (not including travel time) for two different employers but there were no problems other than I was often quite tired.

I had to be very organised. Making sure there were enough clean clothes, keeping track of two sets of mandatory competencies, IDs, colleagues' birthdays, charity days etc.

There was a lot of work just making sure nothing clashed and, if I did need time off, organising both jobs to get time off.

It can be done, but you need to make sure that you're not in a job where second jobs are not allowed or, like a driving job, where there are mandatory set rest periods.

kingfisherblue

My son-in-law worked weekends in a company canteen when he was at university. When he graduated and started a full time job (Mon-Fri, 9-5.30), he kept his weekend job for about eighteen months. This enabled him to save a large chunk of money for a deposit on a house. He was tired at times, but he used the holidays from his jobs at different times so that he wasn't always working seven days a week.

It is possible, but I would have an end date in mind, and don't forget that your social life will suffer.

ohreally

Your employer may require you to sign an opt out.

curiousralphy

torbrex wrote: »

If the second job is completely different to the first then you should not have a problem once the initial burst of tiredness has worn off.

I did 4 jobs at one point in my life all at the same time and it was actually a joy to switch from one to another as it was so different

I second this, I've worked up to 3 jobs at a time at around 68 hours a week in total (full time job, night job and weekend job) but they were all really different in terms of what I had to do so although I was always busy it was not stressful at all.

For comparison I also worked one full time job which had a lot of overtime from 50 - 60 hours a week in total hours but found that overwhelming. Started to feel like I never left the place.

Great way to increase the income and if you put the money aside it's amazing how fast it accumulates. I would recommend a lot of prep work for things like meals and days out. When you work so many hours it's easy to be tempted to spend more money on anything that saves you time, like convenience food, if you have it ready to go at home you're less likely to go down that road.

SailorSam

It depends on the job. When i was on the Cabs i did 7 days most of the time and it could get to be some long long hours. Was i safe to drive? I think sometimes probably not. if it had been a lorry i was driving with goods in it, i would have had a little black box to stop me driving. But i only had people in the back so there were no regulations to limit our hours.

Nicki

A lot also depends on your age and current health. In my 20s I used to regularly work insane hours in the City with no apparent impact on my health. I then took time off to have kids in my 30s. In my 40s, I took another job which also had erratic but sometimes extremely long working hours for a couple of weeks at a time and that has impacted my health to a very noticeable degree (and unfortunately permanent degree).

xapprenticex

Its what you can manage, its a shame that the handful of people who own the world put us into this situation where we have to considr doing things like this.

I wish we were more self sufficient (own land and food) and self employed focused but that wouldn't suit the few that own it all so here we are.

phill99

How do you think working Mothers cope?