Americans, and lack of vacations

[bae]

Apparently many Americans don't even take the limited paid vacations they are offered.

http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/201...acation-nation

That can't be good for long term health and stability.

[kib]

Mastercard has made a commercial about this (obviously to encourage people to take expensive travel days, not just days off), using little kids as commentators. The first little boy, about 4 years old, upon hearing that people leave vacation days unused, says, "That's the stupidest thing I ever heard". His intonation sticks with me and it's one of those phrases I now want to use all the time, but can't because it's rude. Too bad.

http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7NVK/masterca...avel-priceless

[catherine]

I had a client request a quick-turnaround project in the EU at the end of December, and the report had to be delivered in early January, meaning interviews would have to be conducted between Christmas and New Year's. I called a bunch of recruiters and they all basically said, "Are you kidding me? No way. We're on vacation over here." So I told my client that, and she told me to just throw more money at them, assuming that would solve the "problem." I tried to tell her that their vacation isn't for sale, but she didn't believe me until she saw for herself.

We also stay away from international projects in August because there's no way we'll find people do do them. Not the case among my colleagues. Now that I'm freelance, I hear complaints from my corporate colleagues who are pushed to the limit and feel that they have to take work with them on vacation.

[lessisbest]

Hubby has been with the same company for 40-years (in February) and it's rare that he takes all his vacation. When he first got 2-weeks vacation they had a policy where if you worked one week of your vacation time, you could get double pay. So he would work one week of vacation in order to pay for us to go on a vacation for the other week. If you timed it just right during a Monday national holiday, you could get 10-days off for that 5-days of vacation time. They have since removed that policy.....unfortunately. He's in upper management and there's really not a "good" time to be gone so we take a couple day trips each quarter using a couple days of vacation, he also takes off Canadian Thanksgiving (October - our daughter and her family who live 12-hours away always have Columbus Day off - which is also Canadian Thanksgiving - so we've moved Thanksgiving to October and skip the hectic travel time in November) and he usually manages some time off after Christmas.

[Alan]

I get 6 weeks of vacation a year, plus this year (2014) my company instituted a one week paid mental health break in July of each year when they actually shut down operations to ensure that no one is bothered by emails, deadlines, etc. As usual, I'll use the last of my vacation between Christmas and New Years, no paid time off goes to waste in my world.

[Tradd]

I think a lot of it depends on the nature of your work. I actually have a few friends who go away for a week or two, and while they are gone, their workload just sits there. Coworkers provide only minimal, if that, coverage. I can't get my head around that.

I was recently gone for a week (returned Oct. 29). I had to do as much as possible before I left (or prepared). The nature of my work, with constant deadlines from arriving cargo, is different from many others. I handed a few files I wasn't able to get done to a coworker, and she actually got peevish with me because the files weren't pre-done. You only have so much time. If you run out, well, you did as much as you could. I just recovered from being gone Friday, when I finally plowed through the stack of documents received since I was gone that had to be put in the appropriate files. In my case, preparing to be gone for a week is almost too much work. I only am gone for a week once a year. I take the rest of my days in small increments.

I get three weeks vacation (I've been there eight years), plus two personal days and two floating holidays. That's on top of 6-10 sick days (I don't remember the exact number).

My European counterparts aren't gone for all of August. The nature of the business doesn't allow it. But there are definitely fewer shipments from Europe in August.

[Lainey]

One senior manager in my dept. is forfeiting 80 hrs of vacation this year due to a months long project with a hard deadline. That project actually resulted in the recent and earlier-than-he-planned retirement from one guy on the team who was just exhausted.

Agree with bae. This is not good for long term mental and physical health of employees, and good, experienced employees close to retirement are deciding to leave vs. endure any more.

For myself, I have 4 weeks and I take it all including holidays. I'm rarely sick so things don't get backed up, and I'll occasionally work extra hrs to stay current with my workload.

[Tradd]

Lainey, does someone cover your workload while you are gone or does it just sit there? My customers get parceled out to coworkers.

[ApatheticNoMore]

I can see strategically saving vacation days like to say go to interviews (though sick days work much better).

Otherwise the most I've ever gotten is 4 but far far more often it's closer to 2 weeks vacation (it's 12 days a year now). Never more than 5 days sick time, never sick time that carries over more than one year, never any personal days as part of employment. I'm actually often enough genuinely sick, just seasonal bugs, since everyone comes to the office sick it's hard to avoid.

[bae]

I can see strategically saving vacation days like to say go to interviews (though sick days work much better).

I used to save my vacation days to provide me some buffer for when I quit to start the next company.

In retrospect though, the reason I generally wanted to quit involved overworking and never taking vacation days :-)

My very last company had more progressive vacation and sabbatical policies, and that seemed to result in much higher employee happiness and retention - some of the folks I started with there ~20 years ago are still there, and happy about it.