The whole system is crap.

- You receive very little notice. I was given less than a month right before the holidays.

- You're not told how long you'll have to serve. They helpfully mention that most cases take a day or two, but add that some can take weeks. So, what, clear your schedule for the next month? Or just hope the odds are on your side?

- If you're unlucky enough to be sequestered, you're pretty much cut off from society completely for days/weeks.

- You're told to bring a book when you show up because you might have to sit around at the courthouse for most of the day.

- You're paid an absolute pittance that comes nowhere near reimbursing the cost of missing work.

- If you don't want to serve, you have to send a physical snail-mail letter to the court begging to be let off the hook, and it's up to them to decide based on who knows what criteria.

- If you're unable to get out of it, and you cancel all of your plans to accommodate jury duty, you still may be dismissed the night before, or the day of.

In short, the entire jury duty process is/can be expensive, inconvenient and inefficient. It's not just a matter of people being too lazy to put in a couple hours of community service; jury duty is an extremely disruptive life event. Certainly not for everyone and not on every case, but there's always the possibility that you'll take a major financial hit and be tied up for weeks to do a job that, by its very nature, nearly any other citizen could have done in your place. You are a meaningless cog being asked to perform an onerous task under terrible terms with no attempt made to compensate you. It's no wonder people try to get out of jury duty and I can't blame them one bit; the process is draconian.