can you use a ham radio like a business radio on and off all day?

Answer 1

Sir:

You may use a ham radio 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, and 365 days per year unless prohibited from doing so by the US Government for reasons of national emergency/WAR/or things like that.

You may not conduct actual business on ham radio frequencies, however. That is strictly prohibitted, and to conduct business type communications you need to move over to the various business band frequencies using the appropriate licenses and equipment. Some business types of frequencies are time slotted as to usage due to possibly being shared or to limit/direct propagation of the transmitted signals. AM Broadcast Stations for example are often "daytime only." Shortwave broadcasters use shared frequencies. On one hour segment on a particular frequency you may listen to the BBC, and on the same frequency but later in the day, you may listen to a Brazilian broadcast.

The time of day that you operate a ham radio is driven by two general factors...

1.) When is it convenient for you to do so...
2.) And what time of day would you be most likely to meet people you desire to talk with - time zone consideration.

In addition, depending upon the frequency band you choose to operate on, signal propagation may very significantly from day to night. So, with experience you learn what bands and what times are most productive for your desired kinds of communications over ham radio.
The time of day considerations do not hold, however, for most VHF/UHF/Microwave communications. Those higher frequency propagation ranges are almost always short range (as opposed to global, or transcontinental) regardless of time of day.

One other note to consider is that in ham radio a wide range of frequencies are available to choose from depending upon your class of radio license. In business radio you are most certainly limited to a specific frequency or frequencies by your license, such as:
Channel 1 155.261 Mhz FM and
Channel 2 157.335 Mhz. FM
for a taxicab service,
or
Channel 1 7.655 Mhz USB
for a national forestry agent.
(frequencies shown are not exact)

Answer 2

Sure they don't know, Unless you boss happens to recognize your voice one day. You better not be one of my drivers LOL

Answer 3

never