Can we stop laboring on Labor Day?

Labor Day may be coming around, but people don’t seem to stop laboring around the clock.  Here’s an article from the NY Times where news shows are now starting at  4 AM – the dead zone for human performance, when people really screw up and accidents really go up – cue Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.   Several news people have told me they can’t function on their five hours of sleep a day and worry about losing their jobs.

And here is an article from Australia on how teens with 5 hours of sleep have three times the mental health problems – which persist.

So between shift work, insomnia, and early rising for school classes, we’re continuing to create public health messes – and now with earlier local news, people will have more reasons not to rest. Are humans designed to be like the machines we use?