Bob Brown
I am sure you don't wish to appear ignorant so perhaps a little explanation might help.
I have to report for duty 1hr. 20 minutes before departure. Say the flight is 1 hour with a 1 hour turnaround before the 1 hour flight back. It then takes on average 30 minutes minimum to disembark the passengers, do the paperwork and travel back to our reporting centre where we then get a bus to the staff car park. Now I make that a total of 2 hours flying and a total duty of 4hours and 50 minutes. In reality we often do three and four sector days and can be away from home for several days at a time. If you do the sums we do at least the equivalent of a 40 hour week and funny enough with a great deal of responsibility too.
Having actually achieved close to the legal maximum 900 flying hours per year rest assured it is truly exhausting.
Personally I would like well rested pilots on the flight deck of any aircraft in which I was a passenger.