“I believe that Americans are used to working hard.”
Can’t you work “hard” in less than 50 weeks a year??? The week before I go on vacation and the week after vacation are probably my most productive weeks. I’ll work ESPECIALLY hard when I know I have a break coming up (and I’m willing to prepare for it).
For many, many years, I’ve gotten 1 week of vacation plus 1 week of sick leave. And that time is prorated down if our work load slows down and I have shortened weeks. I work at an engineering company. That doesn’t stop me from vacationing - I take off unpaid. That effectively lowers my salary and causes my next year’s vacation to go down due to the prorating. I’m used to it and I enjoy a lot of flexibility in return, but it does suck.
Working hard and working long hours aren’t the same thing.
Post #12, not the Europeans that came and visited my family. One couple called American freaking rich, a bit envy tone. One couple thinking of moving here even because the husband’s dad is an American by naturalization . The only thing that hold them back is recertification of the wife because she is a physician. Sure they have all the time but no money for vacation. The vacation is paid by the husband’s dad because the grandparent want to see the grand kid.
“But I don’t think that low hours of work and large amounts of vacation have helped the French economy much.”
Oh god… here we go. Rolling the eyes
“Oh god… here we go. Rolling the eyes”
That’s kind of oddly rude, however, not unexpected.
Why not, katlia? I think it’s a fair point. Look, I love France, I’d like to retire to the south of France, there are many aspects of their lifestyle I envy, but their economy isn’t the same as ours.
France is one of the biggest economies on the planet. Germany, with its liberal vacation policies (and social services) is even bigger.
And, yes, I rolled my eyes the minute I saw this thread, because I KNEW someone was going to bring up this nonsequitor. I wasn’t disappointed.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3039222/Boost-Tories-UK-economy-overtakes-France-second-largest-EU.html
UK is overtaking France as 2nd biggest economy in Europe.
^^ On average, same amount of paid vacation days per year as France. Clearly, UK’s vacation policy isn’t hurting its growth!
UK has 4 weeks vs France has 5 weeks. I wonder how many weeks does Germany have?
UK has more than 4 weeks. It has 5.6 weeks vacation per year.
I’ve wondered this for years, abasket!!! I remembering meeting Aussies on my first European trip (when dinosaurs roamed) who typically had a month or more vacation after one year of work. I often wonder what the push to work those long US hours are - and am I the only one thinking it’s getting more intense with the immediate response to emails now often expected and the assumption that anyone is available at all hours by cell?
I hope the trip was wonderful! Any terrific discoveries you can share with us??
I just crawled off an international redeye flight, and am headed for a shower then directly to work. It’s gonna be a painful day.
@Momofadult, in Europe they say, “Europeans work to live, Americans live to work.”
Post #31, that’s include bank holidays also, so technically I have 4 weeks also.
^^ You’re lucky. Hang onto that job!
I used to get 37 days…(grandfathered from long ago, foreign company). New company, now I get 26. I couldn’t really ever use the 37 anyway.
I like that commercial for cadillac where the guy talks about it. He says we’re the only ones that left a car on the moon with the keys in it, bc we’re the only ones going back:). It is a trade off, bigger better stuff=more time in. Unfortunately many people have to work that hard for very little tho.
I think work is just ingrained in us. We are raised that way. We live to work. to create, to do…It’s who we are…
As I said, I have clients all over the world. I work for them, so if the guy in Singapore says he wants to meet at 10 am his time and that’s 9 pm my time, so be it. There are times where I’ve listened to focus groups remotely all through the night, or led a Webex seminar at 4 am my time to accommodate others. There really isn’t much way around it, because they don’t really GAS - I work for them, not the other way around. They’re nice about it, of course.
But you get to wear pajamas at 4:00am. My brother has to get up at 4:00am to catch a carpool at 5:00am. It’s hard for him and his blood pressure.