This question is hard to answer as the time given varies depending on the patent classification and seniority. For the application which I'll post an office action for this afternoon, I will be credited 22.6 hours. (I can't claim this is representative of what I'm working on as a whole. Looks to be a bit high for my current docket, but I don't know if my current docket is representative either.) I'm a new examiner and that's the most time anyone will get for one of these applications. A more senior "primary examiner" would only get about 11.6 hours according to my estimate. In that amount of time, try searching for and writing a 10-30+ page report on any non-trivial technology that you have only some familiarity with...
For the same application, the next action I take will get significantly less hours. I get about 4 hours to reply to an amendment (if it's rejected and it usually is). That includes searching and writing it up. I think examiners typically exceed that time and have to go under time for other tasks in order to reply to amendments.
(Again, like my other comments here, this is just my opinion, not that of the USPTO or US government.)
Thanks, that does seem like quite a short amount of time. I've seen what patent attorneys can do to the 2 page technical description that I've written (turn it into 100+ pages of legal nonsense), so I'm sympathetic. IMO it really seems like the USPTO is way understaffed and has been for quite a while then, since it would seem that the majority of the 5+ years is literally just sitting there waiting for someone to get to it.
For the same application, the next action I take will get significantly less hours. I get about 4 hours to reply to an amendment (if it's rejected and it usually is). That includes searching and writing it up. I think examiners typically exceed that time and have to go under time for other tasks in order to reply to amendments.
(Again, like my other comments here, this is just my opinion, not that of the USPTO or US government.)