But before we
can say “I want more vacation time” - let’s first look at how this country’s
corporate culture feels about vacation.
Vacation pay is
not required by U.S. law. In fact U.S.
employers don't have to offer vacation time off even without pay. Vacation pay is strictly voluntary for employers,
but many offer it as a benefit to attract and keep employees. This traditional approach to a vacation
policy has been working up to now, but does it meet the requirements of the
emerging generations, attract top talent, or allow us to compete effectively on
a global basis? Maybe not, but let’s look
at our current US vacation policy and trends.
If employers do
offer vacation pay, then employees are entitled to it under the terms and
conditions in their related policies.
Most employers offer the standard 2 to 3 weeks and sometimes allow employees
to purchase and/or accrue based on policy or contract. In some states, they must offer the accrued
vacation days paid when employment ends.
In most cases, U.S. employees reaching incumbents of 5, 10, 15 or more
years of service are awarded time-off allowances that are similar to those
mandated by the government in other countries for all employees, regardless of
tenure.
Current
research shows about 90 percent of U.S. employers offer vacation. Workers
received an average of nine days of paid vacation and six paid holidays, a total
of 15 days off per year. 28 million
Americans don't get any paid vacation or paid holidays.
Because
offering vacation pay is voluntary for employers, they may impose other
conditions and restrictions as well. For example, your employer can likely require
you to schedule your vacation in advance, only during identified times of the
year, or have you postpone it. Some companies won't allow you to take more than 1
or 2 consecutive weeks of time off. There
always seem to be a feeling of never having time to take a vacation.
We all want more vacation, but the surprising statistic is that US workers often give back more vacation
days than they actually take off, depriving themselves of much-needed breaks. On average, Americans leave at least four
days unclaimed annually.
The United
States is the only advanced economy in the world that does not guarantee its
workers paid vacation days and paid holidays. As we move towards developing new
vacation policies and innovative flexibility to attract talent on a national
and global basis, it will be interesting how the US adopts creative and new
vacation policies to attract the talent we need to fill our open jobs. I would think we would all want to change our
way of thinking about vacation time but culturally we tell a different story.
Many European
employees take up to a month off for vacation at one time (especially in the
summer month of August). So why is it so
difficult for us to take the little vacation time we receive? A recent study shows that US employees are
doing it all wrong by taking short holidays or none at all. It shows that this can create even more stress
and that short team breaks do not recharge our batteries.
It’s important
for us to recharge our batteries with lengthier periods of vacation time. Similarly, it’s critical for US companies to
adopt more creative vacation policies and flexible working environments.
Maybe it is a
generational condition that is leaving the market with the baby boomers and one
that we will no longer see as the next generation of talent enters the
workforce? Or maybe employers just
simply need to rethink their vacation policies to remain competitive in the war
for talent.
Then again, how
many of us go on vacation and don’t check our work email?
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