Comment by hurflmurfl | Hacker News Reader

Comment by hurflmurfl | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

I believe that the difference IS obvious, but it's the "absolute" difference.

The relative difference may very well not exist between the two scenarios. If I can't just go to the beach with my wife, if I can't go walk the dog in the farther-away park, if I can't play an online game that lasts over 40 minutes per match, if I can't schedule a music lesson - then if the above is my definition of free time, then it's going to be difficult to convince me that there's a difference between "you can't do this because you're working" and "you can't do this because you're on-call". All it takes is that I take "can't do it" seriously enough.

If your typical day-off is filled with "short" activities, if you being on-call doesn't affect plans of other people close to you, if you plan your month so that you do all the housework & chores on your on-call days, then you'll probably be OK and will testify to the huge difference between the two.

The perception of this difference will thus vary from person to person, from circumstances to circumstances, from lifestyle to lifestyle.

>it's going to be difficult to convince me that there's a difference between "you can't do this because you're working" and "you can't do this because you're on-call"

But there *is* a difference, and that difference is exactly why you're paid 2/3 of your normal rate instead of 100% (or 150% as some people are saying). You aren't working, but you aren't entirely free either, so you are compensated for that by being paid something that is not quite your full rate. *OR* (at least by Google guidelines) you can accrue enough time to be able to fully take a day off later to make up for that time lost.

By the way depending on the day, requirements, oncall shift, style, etc you can definitely relax, play games, go to the beach, etc. Just because you are oncall it doesn't mean you can't categorically do any of those activities (unlike if you were *actually* working), it just means that you need to have a laptop nearby with internet access and temporarily drop whatever you are doing to be able to deal with an outage if it happens. For this reason, the company pays you, but it's not a full rate.

Now we are discussing subjectivities and it makes no sense continuing the discussion IMHO.

At some point I also romaticized the idea of being on the beach enjoying myself when the pager goes off. So I jump into a terminal, get the adrenaline rush, fix the problem, save the day, and carry on. That narrative just doesn't work for me anymore.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com