On 21 août 06, at 05:50, Wendy Lyon wrote:
> On 8/20/06, Carl Remick <carlremick at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> About 25 percent of American workers in the private sector do not
>> get any
>> paid vacation time, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports.
>
> This is one of those things that makes Europeans' jaws hit the floor.
> They really can't quite believe that there is *no* statutory right to
> vacation time in the US.
Think Japan, where they do have a right to vacation but usually do not take any. I was making a presentation in Osaka in January and asked the people who attended how many of them had taken a full week off in the 12 months. If I remember well I got only a few hands raised out of about 80 people.
> Americans, OTOH, are always shocked by how much vacation time
> Europeans get (here in Ireland it's four weeks, and that's not high by
> Euro standards) and usually say something like "how do European
> companies make any money that way?" Which always struck me as
> nonsensical. I suppose it depends what type of work you're doing, but
> it's tended to be my experience that when someone goes away for two
> weeks or more, their work still gets done because other employees
> cover for them ... whereas when they're only gone for a short time the
> attitude of "it can wait til s/he gets back" kicks in. Hence, longer
> holidays => less resulting drop in productivity. I have no idea
> whether this has ever been tested empirically though, anyone know?
From my experience in France, things are a little different. If you go to Paris from the 14th of July to the 15th of August you'll find a lot of small shops just closed. For offices, it is just similar, the run very slow, with probably half the staffing.
My brother in Law who works for an American company happens to be in charge of "sales" worldwide, whatever he sells, and he has no problem taking 2 weeks off with his family. Being the only one in that position, "sales" (or at least his activity) are just off "worldwide" for that company (with no doubt people working in different areas during the period).
I happened to have taken 3 weeks off my freelance worker life from Japan (_no_ paid vacation for me) to go back to France with the children and there were reports running in the news about one third the population _not_ being able to take any vacations, which also means that 2/3 do take some.
Think about the activity that generates. Business off on one side of the economy and super busy on the other side. I suppose that is something Japan and the US has yet to figure out: organizing a business culture that promotes vacation _as_ an economic stimulator for the economy.
This year was the 70th anniversary of the Popular Front, which no doubt prompted special reporting about this issue too.
Jean-Christophe