If technology keeps saving us time at work, why do we never get that time back?

I've been thinking about this lately, especially with all the talk about AI and how much more productive it's going to make everyone.

Think about how office work was done 30 or 40 years ago. No emails, no instant access to information, way more paperwork, phone calls, filing, etc. Things that used to take hours can now be done in minutes. And yet, most of us are still working around 40 hours a week.

So where did all that saved time go?

I'm a lawyer, so I'll use my profession as an example.

Let's say AI gets to the point where I no longer need a receptionist, an assistant, or someone doing legal research for me. My firm can now produce the same amount of work with significantly fewer employees. That's a huge productivity gain right there.

But there's another side to it. If something that used to take me five billable hours now takes one, I can't really charge my client for five hours anymore. So to maintain the same revenue, I'll need more clients and more files. I'll still be working 40 hours a week, just handling a much larger caseload.

Meanwhile, the firm has significantly reduced its payroll. It might be producing more work, spending less on salaries, and making more profit. But nobody is going to come to the remaining employees and say, "Hey, we just cut our payroll by 35% thanks to technology, here's your share of those savings."

And this isn't just about AI. We've been doing this for decades. Computers, Word, Excel, email, the internet, automation. Every new technology makes certain tasks faster or eliminates them entirely.

But instead of working fewer hours, we just seem to fill that time with more work.

I understand that some of the gains are passed on to consumers through lower prices, and that productivity also contributes to economic growth. I'm not suggesting all the benefits go directly into employers' pockets.

But it seems to me that when technology saves a worker 10 hours of work per week, those 10 hours don't become free time. They become an opportunity for the employer to assign more work, take on more clients, or operate with fewer employees.

So the business becomes more productive, the economy becomes more productive, but the individual worker doesn't necessarily earn more or work less.

And I guess that's what I'm struggling with. If the whole point of technology is to make work easier and faster, why haven't we seen a meaningful reduction in the standard working week?

Are we actually benefiting from these productivity gains as workers, or are we mostly just expected to produce more in the same amount of time?

I'm genuinely curious what people think, especially if there's an economic explanation I'm overlooking.