American workers are being told to go to sleep on the job, according to Dermot Purgavie in the Daily Mail. “Nap breaks” are becoming increasingly popular in offices, factories and even long-haul aeroplane cockpits. “It’s now as important for employers to offer a nap break as it is for them to have a coffee break”, says P.M. Clary, a manager with a Californian computer consulting firm. Forty minutes’ sleep during the day can improve morale and increase productivity, and, according to research by Nasa, it can improve the alertness of pilots. “There are two periods when the body naturally wants to sleep − between two and four in the morning and two and four in the afternoon,” Heidi Wunder of Washington’s National Sleep Foundation tells the paper. “We’re bogged down in the view that sleep isn’t productive.” William Anthony, a psychology professor at Boston University, agrees. Leonardo da Vinci, Napoleon and Brahms all liked a little shut-eye, he says. “It’s time for nappers to lie down and be counted.”