24 hour Living - Modern Life?

24 Hour Services have become a sign of the modern age. You need to photocopy documents, bind them, print your company image on the cover....oh and you need 300 copies of them....at 3 A.M. ???!!! There is a service to provide it. Kinko's now has a 24 hour service store for such "normal" requests. Need a courier to deliver company work...in the middle of the night, get a corporate courier. Wanna go to the gym after midnight, no problem there is a 24 hour fitness center. Pharmacies, Ice Cream Parlors, Carpet cleaners, Steak Houses, Chinese Food, Pharmacies, Computer stores, Gas Stations, and bowling alleys are only a few examples of this new phenomenon (by new I mean within the last 5-10 years). Services that were once provided for during normal working hours (9-9) are now being offered all the time.

Of course it doesn't just include the stores that are open 24 hours for human services, but also factories, support lines, assembly lines, and other manufacturing jobs that churn up products through the night.

Now, we can look at it in a positive way....after all if you need practically anything in the middle of the night you can get it. How can you complain about that??!!! Also modern society has used 24 hour services to provide for important services (Hospitals, Security Guards, Pharmacies, Locksmiths, Gas Stations ) of course these services are needed due to the emergency nature of them. Not to mention that productivity has increased incredibily due to factories and assembly lines use all 24 hours to produce. But there are some drawbacks to this trend, but before we delve into them lets take a look at some of the reasons why this 24 hour phenomenon took off:
1) The most obvious reason is to increase productivity per working day. If you have three shifts of workers working 8 hours a day then you double if not triple your productivity on the assembly line or any other type of labor.
2) To gain a comparative advantage over competition (if one pharmacy can be 24 hours, customers are more likely to join them than a competing pharmacy that doesn't provide it even if they will never really use it....just the idea of it being available is great).
3) To serve the workers that work in other overnight shifts (An employee of the bowling alley wants to get coffee and donuts and he can because there is a donut shop open overnight).
4) To do work that is impossible to do during the day. This would be a good use....customer service face to face takes a lot of time, if you can do most of your maintenance and non interactive work for your business during the night it alleviates the pressure from the morning staff.
5) To maximize on their rent money!! :) Companies pay big bucks to rent their space, might as well use it efficiently (I am not sure how efficient if you have staff working and utilities going during the night).

There are probably many more reasons but that's not the point.
The reason I bring this topic up is because I think its a bad trend. At face value it looks like a great deal and a sign that capitalism has won by providing us with more services at a faster rate. But if you look closer you will see that the effects it has on the people that work these jobs might not be worth the luxury. Now before I go on, let it be known I am talking about 24 hour services that are not deemed important (Anything other than Hospitals, one or two Pharmacies - maybe, Security, Police, Ambulance, Fire Department, and a few Gas Stations).

Family life is influenced for sure. Imagine working the night shift, getting home when your kids are ready to go to school. You don't get to see them. You go home and sorta sleep, but not really, by the time they are home you need to sleep a bit before going to your night shift.

Imagine you and your wife (or husband) take shifts (no pun intended) taking care of your preschool kids. One spouse works the mornings while the other sits home with them, then they switch in the afternoon, and they both sleep at night....great for savings (no babysitting money) and maybe better because both parents get to spend time with the kids but not healthy as a whole family.

Or imagine you do an overnight shift (or even just night shift) for two weeks then you flip to morning shifts for the next two weeks. It takes a couple of days to get your body in rhythm again.

These are subtle but serious issues that cause the family life and values to erode.

If we look at the whole scientific aspect of the Circadian rhythm and how if disturbed it causes more errors (costing lives and lots of money), burnout, depression, aggressive behaviour, and other problems. Why??? Well, maybe because working in the middle of the night is unnatural, plain and simple. Anyways so the point is, is it worth it?? Is it worth the mental and psychological strain for the sake of productivity? Sometimes the answer is yes. I think most of the time the answer should be no.


Here are a couple of articles you might find interesting to read.

Article #1

Article #2

Article #3

Circadian rhythm sleep disorder