“Too much work, and no vacation…”
Julie Schwartz Weber April 23rd, 2008
Last month, Experience Life Magazine published, “No Vacation Nation,” in which John De Graaf, President of Take Back Your Time, underscores both the lack of vacation time granted to Americans, and the importance of vacation for “improved physical and mental health, family life, productivity, creativity and personal well-being.” De Graaf notes,
“Americans may be materially richer than almost anyone else, but we have the poorest health in the industrial world…In 1980, we ranked 11th in the world in longevity; now we’re 42nd. We are twice as likely as Europeans to suffer from anxiety and depression. In large part, these deficits are caused by lack of time.”
The Center for Economic and Policy Research reports that about one fourth of the U.S. workforce has no paid vacation in the course of their work year. Part-time workers, low-income earners, and workers in small establishments (fewer than 100 workers) are less likely to receive paid vacation and paid holidays, and when they do, these workers receive fewer paid days off. Specifically, lower-wage workers are less likely (69%) than higher-wage workers (88%) to have paid vacations, and part-timers are far less likely to have paid vacations (36%) than are full-timers (90%). Similarly, only 70% of employees in small establishments receive paid vacations.
CEPR also reports that there is no government mandate for even 1 paid vacation day in the U.S., but that 137 other countries (including all industrial nations) guarantee their workers at least 20 paid vacation days or 4 weeks time.
[...] Compared to the rest of the world, the U.S. is an outlier around vacation time with 137 countries (including all industrialized nations) mandating a minimum of 4 weeks of paid vacation time. In the U.S., there are no laws requiring employees to have any paid vacation time so employers offer paid vacation time at their discretion. As noted by Julie Weber here on the Work and Family Blog, [...]