All Work and No Play
While summer vacation has drawn to a close, most people haven’t even taken anytime off. The Time magazine article, “Save the American Vacation” states that only 87% of full-time workers get paid vacation and only 34% of part-time employees. Workers feel worn out from all their work, but won’t take vacations in fear of seaming lazy or getting behind on projects. Workers should get more paid vacation days in America because it increases worker happiness and productivity and because other countries are showing the benefits of time off.

One of the main reasons American workers don’t take as much time off as they should is because they are afraid of losing promotions due to being seen as lazy. The down side to this is workers are overworking themselves. This overworking just leads to lower quality work, which is detrimental to the employee and the company. If companies encouraged more vacation days, workers would be more inclined to take these days allowing for the companies workers to recharge and produce better work after they come back. As the article states, even when employees take vacations, 61% still do some type of work during their vacation. Companies should be encouraging employees to take vacation days to disconnect from work to keep their workers performing their best.

American workers are suffering the most because many of their european counterparts are already adopting this philosophy of more vacations. Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Norway all guaranteed at least 28 paid days off compared to Americas average of 16 paid days off, which isn’t even guaranteed to all employees. These increased days off also correlate to the fact that these three countries are the top ranking for worker productivity. These statistics show that there isn’t a disadvantage to America adopting this vacation policy.

Compared to European countries, America falls way behind in offering paid vacation day. Having more of these vacation days will help build a more productive workforce by allowing employees to take time to recharge without fearing what’s waiting for them when they come back to their jobs. This practice of vacation days has become a standard across Europe, and it should become a standard in America too. It will help lead to a more productive, happier, and high quality producing workforce, which will help America grow their economy even faster.
['Emma George']
['Work Life Balance', 'Vacation', 'Work', 'America']