Ban after-work emails and calls? Tech bosses say you might as well ‘ban startups’
San Francisco tech leaders are taking to the digital barricades over a proposed California law that would make it illegal for your boss to contact you after work hours, saying it would hamstring the startups that drive the city’s economy.
Assemblymember Matt Haney, who represents San Francisco, introduced AB 2751, which introduces a so-called “right to disconnect” by ignoring calls, emails, texts and Slack messages sent after agreed-upon working hours. Messages for emergencies or scheduling reasons would be exempt from the law.
Garry Tan, CEO of San Francisco startup accelerator Y Combinator, posted, “Legalize hard work” before slamming Haney as “the guy who killed algebra and spun up the fentanyl crisis in the Tenderloin.”
Y Combinator co-founder Paul Graham tweeted a bit of an ode to late-night work, writing, “Some of the very best work is done late at night. Not just at startups, but in research too. That's when you can work on hard problems without distractions.
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