European holidays vs US vacations
Posted: Mon Aug 09, 2004 6:27 pm
Think we're doing something wrong over here in the United States to take only one vacation a year? My husband can only get away for one week a year for our family trips and can take 5 more days, here and there, which adds up to only 2 weeks a year. Sure we would be nice to vacation 6 weeks a year!
Please don't turn this into a political debate, that wasn't my intent. Makes me wonder if on the job stress levels are lower in Europe than the US. Thoughts anyone?
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http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/08/ ... 4664.shtml
LONDON, August 9, 2004
Unwinding on the French Riveria, along the Promenade des Anglais, in Nice. Long vacations are de rigueur in France, but many in France can no longer afford them. (Photo: AP)
Europeans have long prided themselves in having what they believe is a fairer society than Americans. Social benefits are more generous and everyone has medical coverage, in addition to long vacations.
(CBS) Tom Fenton, in his fourth decade with CBS News, has been the network's Senior European Correspondent since 1979. He comments on international events from his "Listening Post" in London, and other parts of the world as well.\
The ideological arguments between the New World and Old Europe are not limited to the invasion of Iraq and America's role as the sole superpower. There is another profound gulf between the two sides of the Atlantic. It's the vacation gap.
Europeans take lots of them, and seem to think that's what life is all about. Americans take far fewer vacations, and even feel a little guilty about them.
One of the broadsides Michael Moore fired at President Bush in "Fahrenheit 9/11" was the charge first reported by The Washington Post that he spent 42 percent of his first eight months in office on vacation. How dare he!
Europeans, on the other hand, think vacations are a basic human right. Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer recently announced that the government criteria for defining poverty will be broadened to include families that cannot afford a week's vacation every year.
In the European Union, at least four weeks a year is considered normal, and most people take more. Many Europeans need six weeks of vacation time so they can fit in those family skiing trips in the winter in addition to the beach in the summer. Even the Chinese take three weeks.
Statisticians say American vacations are the shortest in the industrialized world: 8.1 days a year. That's just enough to be above the British poverty line.
The result, says the International Labor Organization, is that Americans work twelve weeks a year more than Europeans.
You probably know that the French Socialists, a few years ago before they were voted out of office, enacted a statutory 35-hour limit for the work week. The Germans have the same limit. What you may not have heard is that the European 35-hour week is not working.
It was supposed to create more jobs. What it has done is damage the French and German economies. Businesses can no longer afford it, and several German firms have already convinced their unions to agree to a longer working hours with no increase in weekly pay. That is a small revolution and it may be a harbinger of a profound change in European thinking.
Europeans have long prided themselves in having what they believe is a fairer society than Americans. Social benefits are more generous and everyone has medical coverage, in addition to long vacations. America, by contrast, is painted in popular European mythology as the land of savage free market capitalism, where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
Well, the highly respected Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has just published a report that claims that inequalities in living conditions are greater in the Euro zone than in the United States. In addition, the report states, "U.S. income per capita is 30 percent above the Euro area's and is widening."
I have just come back from a seaside vacation in a popular French summer resort. The tourist business there is down 30 percent this summer. The problem, say local businessmen, is not a shortage of foreign tourists. It's the French who are staying away. They can no longer afford those long vacations.
_______________________
Please don't turn this into a political debate, that wasn't my intent. Makes me wonder if on the job stress levels are lower in Europe than the US. Thoughts anyone?
________________________
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/08/ ... 4664.shtml
LONDON, August 9, 2004
Unwinding on the French Riveria, along the Promenade des Anglais, in Nice. Long vacations are de rigueur in France, but many in France can no longer afford them. (Photo: AP)
Europeans have long prided themselves in having what they believe is a fairer society than Americans. Social benefits are more generous and everyone has medical coverage, in addition to long vacations.
(CBS) Tom Fenton, in his fourth decade with CBS News, has been the network's Senior European Correspondent since 1979. He comments on international events from his "Listening Post" in London, and other parts of the world as well.\
The ideological arguments between the New World and Old Europe are not limited to the invasion of Iraq and America's role as the sole superpower. There is another profound gulf between the two sides of the Atlantic. It's the vacation gap.
Europeans take lots of them, and seem to think that's what life is all about. Americans take far fewer vacations, and even feel a little guilty about them.
One of the broadsides Michael Moore fired at President Bush in "Fahrenheit 9/11" was the charge first reported by The Washington Post that he spent 42 percent of his first eight months in office on vacation. How dare he!
Europeans, on the other hand, think vacations are a basic human right. Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer recently announced that the government criteria for defining poverty will be broadened to include families that cannot afford a week's vacation every year.
In the European Union, at least four weeks a year is considered normal, and most people take more. Many Europeans need six weeks of vacation time so they can fit in those family skiing trips in the winter in addition to the beach in the summer. Even the Chinese take three weeks.
Statisticians say American vacations are the shortest in the industrialized world: 8.1 days a year. That's just enough to be above the British poverty line.
The result, says the International Labor Organization, is that Americans work twelve weeks a year more than Europeans.
You probably know that the French Socialists, a few years ago before they were voted out of office, enacted a statutory 35-hour limit for the work week. The Germans have the same limit. What you may not have heard is that the European 35-hour week is not working.
It was supposed to create more jobs. What it has done is damage the French and German economies. Businesses can no longer afford it, and several German firms have already convinced their unions to agree to a longer working hours with no increase in weekly pay. That is a small revolution and it may be a harbinger of a profound change in European thinking.
Europeans have long prided themselves in having what they believe is a fairer society than Americans. Social benefits are more generous and everyone has medical coverage, in addition to long vacations. America, by contrast, is painted in popular European mythology as the land of savage free market capitalism, where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
Well, the highly respected Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has just published a report that claims that inequalities in living conditions are greater in the Euro zone than in the United States. In addition, the report states, "U.S. income per capita is 30 percent above the Euro area's and is widening."
I have just come back from a seaside vacation in a popular French summer resort. The tourist business there is down 30 percent this summer. The problem, say local businessmen, is not a shortage of foreign tourists. It's the French who are staying away. They can no longer afford those long vacations.
_______________________
