While some social media users went on to slam capitalism over this new toilet innovation, other made joking suggestions about the potential upside.

As companies around the world strive to develop new means to boost employees’ efficiency, it appears that one venture is setting its sights on bathrooms and bathroom breaks in pursuit of this goal.

According to the Guardian, a startup called StandardToilet has determined that a toilet with a 13-degree downward tilt would be uncomfortable to sit on for more that few minutes, thus possibly allowing companies to increase their employees’ productivity as workers would spend less time on bathroom breaks.

BREAKING NEWS: Say goodbye to comfort breaks! New downward-tilting toilets are designed to become unbearable to sit on after five minutes. They say the main benefit is to employees in improved employee productivity. pic.twitter.com/lfDbeXJdCX — Dave Vescio (@DaveVescio) 17 декабря 2019 г.

​The media outlet also notes that StandardToilet calculated that “employees are spending an average of 10 minutes a day on the toilet” and that an estimated £4 billion (about $5.2 billion) is lost annually “answering Mother Nature’s call”.

Many social media users seemed less than pleased by this development, making critical remarks about corporate policies and about capitalism as a whole.

Surely the raise in productivity will correspond with a raise in wages right?



Ahahaha just kidding you just hate working people. — ᚦᚩᚱᚣ ᚧᚣ ᚾᚪᚱᚹᚪᛚ (@WhaleHorned) 17 декабря 2019 г.

And people wonder why people hate capitalism — Jessie (Homestuck^2 & Pesterquest spoilers) (@waffley57) 17 декабря 2019 г.

I have Crohn's Disease, all this does is make life harder for people like me when we're probably already not feeling that great in the first place. Thanks capitalism! — jml (@__JML__) 17 декабря 2019 г.

Maybe give us actual breaks and we wouldn't hide in the bathroom — Dylan's new director of coffee (@imabigfatdynamo) 17 декабря 2019 г.

Good to know that while wages are stagnant, corporate America still has the money to punish workers for a minute of time to themselves. — Nice Boy Billy (@Your_Pal_Billy) 17 декабря 2019 г.

Some netizens also made tongue-in-cheek suggestions about how to counter this innovation.

if you pack enough toilet paper on top of the seat you can fix the angle, plus then your company has to pay more for toilet paper. win/win — chirping bird (@ChrpngBrd) 17 декабря 2019 г.

Just put your legs out in front of you and put the weight in your heels. Problem solved.



But I gotta wonder about ADA compliance — 🇼˗ˏˋuıʍʇʎdəəɹɔˎˊ˗👑King of the Reply Guys🗨️☃️🎄 (@creeptwin) 17 декабря 2019 г.

In unrelated news, introducing my 13 degree toilet seat attachment — The Vaporwave Guy (@5five0oh4four) 17 декабря 2019 г.

And at least one person made a snarky remark about how one might respond to such measures.