The eight hour work day is one of the most justified demands of the workers… Nobody who feels even just a trace of social feeling within himself will be able to stand aloof from the moral as well as the social-political justification for this demand. Well, work, as is known, is not an end in itself, rather only a means to an end.

By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may eventually get to be a boss and work twelve hours a day. — ROBERT FROST, American poet and winner of four Pulitzer Prizes

How is it possible that all the people in the world need exactly 8 hours to accomplish their work? It isn’t. 9–5 is arbitrary.

You don’t have eight creative, problem-solving hours in the day - you have two.

Spend your time wisely.

By faithfully working eight hours a day you may eventually get to be boss and work twelve hours a day.

By working faithfully 8 hours a day, you may eventually get to be the boss and work 12 hours a day. ~ Robert Frost

By working faithfully 8 hours a day, you may eventually get to be the boss and work 12 hours a day. — Robert Frost

Eight hours daily labour is enough for any human being, and under proper arrangements sufficient to afford an ample supply of food, raiment and shelter, or the necessaries and comforts of life, and for the remainder of his time, every person is entitled to education, recreation and sleep.

One of the saddest things is that the only thing a man can do for eight hours a day, day after day, is work. You can't eat eight hours a day nor drink for eight hours a day nor make love for eight hours — all you can do for eight hours is work. Which is the reason why man makes himself and everybody else so miserable and unhappy.

Fifty years ago, it was utopian to dream of an eight-hour working day, as it is still a utopia to dream of a limitation of working hours in proletarian housekeeping. But utopias are invented to be realized, and as long as there is no demand for an improvement of living conditions, changing things is impossible.

There were many things I could do for two or three days and earn enough money to live on for the rest of the month. By temperament I'm a vagabond and a tramp. I don't want money badly enough to work for it. In my opinion it's a shame that there is so much work in the world. One of the saddest things is that the only thing that a man can do for eight hours a day, day after day, is work. You can't eat eight hours a day nor drink for eight hours a day nor make love for eight hours — all you can do for eight hours is work. Which is the reason why man makes himself and everybody else so miserable and unhappy.

Foolish and reactionary and Conservative contraband practices must not be carried on under the Fascista flag… We are the first to recognize that a State law should grant the eight-hour day, and that there should be social legislation corresponding to the exigencies of the new times.

Our civilisation being what it is, you've got to spent eight hours out of every twenty-four as a mixture between an imbecile and a sewing machine. It's very disagreeable, I know. It's humiliating and disgusting. But there you are. You've got to do it, otherwise the whole fabric of our world will fall to bits and we'll starve. Do the job then, idiotically and mechanically; and spend your leisure hours in being a real complete man or woman.

The fundamental reality for every worker, from sweeper to executive vice-president, is the eight hours or so that he spends on the job. In our society of organizations, it is the job through which the great majority has access to achievement, to fulfillment, and to community.