‘If you look at Japan, China…’: Billionaire Sridhar Vembu warns against…., in taking an aim at Narayana Murthy

The debate over the ‘70-hour work week’ has been reignited by Zoho Corporation CEO Sridhar Vembu, a concept initially proposed by billionaire businessman and Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy. The discussion resurfaced with Vembu’s detailed post on X, where he responded to the controversial idea, raising questions about its necessity and consequences.

Vembu took to X and wrote, “The rationale behind the 70-hour work week is ‘it is necessary for economic development.’”

He drew interesting parallels with the economic progress of East Asian nations like Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and China, attributing their growth extensively to their Herculean work ethic. Despite this, he argued that they are now facing an unprecedented crisis of declining population due to the drastically low birth rates. This situation has led to their governments urging their people to increase the family size.

The Zoho corporation CEO raised two questions – “Is such hard work necessary for economic development? Is such a development even worth the price of a lonely old age for a large mass of people?”

However, Vembu’s answers diverged from Murthy’s stance.

Answering the first question, Vembu said that extreme hard work isn’t essential for everyone. “It is enough if only a small percentage of the population drive themselves hard—maybe 2-5%. The rest can maintain a decent work-life balance.”.

Vembu further added that he belongs to a group that works intensely but wouldn’t impose the same idea on others.

Responding to the second question, the Zoho CEO said, “No, it is not worth it,” while rejecting the thought of replicating economic model of neighbouring China at the cost of demographic decrease.

He raise alarm against India following the same path of China, “India is already at replacement level fertility, and further declines to East Asian levels won’t be good,” Vembu said.

Vembu concluded by sharing his optimistic outlook for sustainable development, stating, “I firmly believe we can advance without necessarily steering ourselves into a demographic downfall.”