Vacation and being American question ... .

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zs1234

Registered Users (C)
My fellow immigrants, only the USA has no law for minimum vacation. In Europe (where I am from) the minimum average is ~23 business days per year. In India it is about 20, and so is also in China (I think).

Should'nt we advance the USA culturally too (in addition to technologically)?

Even if a country's productivity was more important than our personal quality of life, half of our birth countries are as productive as the USA (especially if factoring in outsourcing).

Do you have any ideas how this agenda could be pushed forward politically, legally, and culturally here? What arguments and research materials could be used to support this? (Or is this not worth the sweat because we love our employers and their majority shareholders that much?)
 
Do you have any idea about how long it takes to get a birth certificate etc from Indian Government? Not only certificate anything from them is same. I think they need to remove those vacation days. Have you ever tried to talk to Indian Embasy or consulate in US?
 
The fundamental capitalist nature of the US would likely never allow for a law providing a minimum amount of vacation.

Having said that, I work for a US company in the US and receive 28 days vacation (up over time from, I think 22, for new hires), and this seems to be quite normal in tech companies these days.
 
I wish it was true at the east coast too.

Dms1, how do you negotiated it without looking "lazy"? Can you list a few of those companies that are this civilized? Where do you search for them? Thanks.
 
zs1234 said:
Dms1, how do you negotiated it without looking "lazy"? Can you list a few of those companies that are this civilized? Where do you search for them? Thanks.
Click to expand...

"Civilized"? Um, it's a negotiation. They offer you a job with certain conditions, and you either take it or leave it. And no, there isn't a country as productive as the United States.
 
zs1234 said:
Dms1, how do you negotiated it without looking "lazy"? Can you list a few of those companies that are this civilized? Where do you search for them? Thanks.
Click to expand...
Actually, with most large companies, vacation time is one of the harder things to negotiate if not impossible. Companies tend to have core benefits packages that cannot be easily altered on an individual basis. Of course, there is nothing to stop you trying to negotiate a higher salary and the option to take a certain amount of unpaid leave over and above your vacation.

As for which companies offer good vacation packages (20+ days), look for larger international companies that are in competitive markets. European companies with a relatively small US operation may be particularly good, but, having said that, my employer is international but US-based and still generous.
 
A lot of US companies think if that people are in their cubes they are "more" productive. Never mind if they are stressed out, or doing nothing.
 
The US is only #7 in quality of life including productivity ... .

Check out this link:

.../gaebler.com/Productivity-and-Vacation-Comparisons-by-Country.???

This is a Quality of Life indicator study by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the Japan Productivity Center for Socio-Economic Development (JPC-SED) and takes into account the average life span, healthcare system, productivity numbers, higher education levels and gross domestic product in each country.

It finds that:

Of the 30 nations listed in the study (most of them non-G8 members), the U.S. was seventh overall while Japan, France and Germany were 14th, 15th, and 16th respectively. The top Quality of Life countries were Luxembourg (#1), Norway (#2), Switzerland (#3), Denmark (#4), Sweden (#5) and Iceland (#6).

So we (new and old) Americans are far not the best. It may be useful to bring up the US to the above standards.
 
...All of them have small populations and, with the exception of Norway, small territories. It's not a fair comparison.
 
I guess it was not completely fair, but ...

In wikipedia:

...//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_statutory_minimum_employment_leave_by_country

about 100 countries are listed for their minimum paid vacations by law, and only the USA has 0.

Isn't this awful?

(+ Where is the hotel and travel lobby in Washington, to push for some vacation?)
 
Agreed-they just offer too few vacation days here. I was reaing that even the Japanese get more vacation than us. Sigh!

But I wonder if it would fly in this country. All they are trying to do is offer some sembance of health care for all and you have cries of socialists/communists going up-can you imagine the outcry if they say companies have to give so many days vacation. I think it is good-but I wonder if it will fly in this economic climate?
 
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