Will AI kill the 9-5? A long read traces the workday back to Josiah Wedgwood's 1769 pottery factory
Konstantine · x · 2026-10-31
The essay Will AI Kill the 9-5? traces the standard workday to Josiah Wedgwood's 1769 Staffordshire pottery factory: he split pottery-making into specialized steps and fought tardiness and "Saint Monday" absenteeism with standardized hours. Before that, daylight and the task defined work.
Its argument: AI, by removing the need for scheduled shift-based task coordination, may finally dismantle the workday regime invented 250 years ago.
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