Your annual vacation/holidays

[Riker'sMailbox]

Our big vacation will be to Disney World, again. I have two little kids, so it is amazing fun.

We also spend a lot of time at our summer home on Shelter Island. My husband and I do weekend getaways a few times a year various spots in New England.

 

[Spot's Meow]

We used to have that too, but some people who had been there a long time accumulated up to 10 weeks vacation. The company decided they didn't like that, so they switched us to "use it or lose it".

There is a cap on vacation hours, which gets higher with every 5-10 years of service you put in. I'm not very close to the cap, but I believe most of my co-workers are coming up against it. You just stop accruing once you hit the cap. I work with a very dedicated bunch of people, so it's easy for me to see why they have so much accumulated. We are A-type personalities who want to get the job done, so taking time off when you don't have an actual trip planned seems odd. This is entirely self-imposed, the bosses encourage us to use our vacation time.

I have no problem using mine. But, I don't have kids, so it's easier for me to just decide to up and leave for a few days. I also have no problem using my vacation time to sit at home. In fact, those vacations are the best!

 

[MacLeod]

There is a cap on vacation hours, which gets higher with every 5-10 years of service you put in. I'm not very close to the cap, but I believe most of my co-workers are coming up against it. You just stop accruing once you hit the cap. I work with a very dedicated bunch of people, so it's easy for me to see why they have so much accumulated. We are A-type personalities who want to get the job done, so taking time off when you don't have an actual trip planned seems odd. This is entirely self-imposed, the bosses encourage us to use our vacation time.

I have no problem using mine. But, I don't have kids, so it's easier for me to just decide to up and leave for a few days. I also have no problem using my vacation time to sit at home. In fact, those vacations are the best!

I don't think it's quite as simple to say type A personalities want to get the job done. I likely lean more towards type B but that doesn't mean I don't want to get my work down in the quickest and easiest manner as possible so I can have more free time to do the stuff I want to do.

 

[Gryffindorian]

I think it's more of a cultural difference than a personality factor. Most people in the U.S. probably work an average of 40 hours a week (8 hours x 5 days), regardless of whether or not the job gets done. A lot of times, it doesn't even take eight hours to complete a task! (Geez! What a concept!) In countries like Japan, a 10 to 12 hour workday might be the norm. Certain European countries have more vacation leave to offer.

 

[Kilana2]

I think it's more of a cultural difference than a personality factor. Most people in the U.S. probably work an average of 40 hours a week (8 hours x 5 days), regardless of whether or not the job gets done. A lot of times, it doesn't even take eight hours to complete a task! (Geez! What a concept!) In countries like Japan, a 10 to 12 hour workday might be the norm. Certain European countries have more vacation leave to offer.

I need my vacation. I don't want to work myself into a burnout. Although my job isn't physically demanding. A 39 h per week desk job involving counseling sessions. I have to hear a lot of stories about bad health, great misfortunes and financial problems of unemployed people, many of them with serious health issues preventing them to find regular and physically demanding jobs. And for desk job they lack the proper education. So I have to get away from this for several days to keep my sanity.

 

[Owain Taggart]

This past summer on our way back from our eclipse trip, we were driving a long stretch of road along the north of lake superior. In the afternoon, it had started to fog up pretty badly. Earlier in the day, I had checked booking.com for accommodations, but I was becoming increasingly concerned because almost non had vacancies, which I had learned was because of construction crews, and along that stretch of road, there really wasn't very much and certainly no big chains to speak of. The fog was becoming worse as the day wore on and visibility was terrible at night to the point that we couldn't really see much of what was in front of us. We were getting pretty desperate to find something, and it had already been a long day of driving. Eventually, we saw a motel and while we saw the no vacancy sign, my Dad had wanted to ask just on the chance that something, somewhere would be available. Our luck was with us, as while that hotel was full-up, his parents ran another motel 5 miles down the road. He called them up and they were expecting us. Even knowing how far it was, we still had difficulty finding it in the thick fog. If anyone knows the stretch of road between Thunder Bay and Schreiber, you'll know what I mean.

 

[MacLeod]

I need my vacation. I don't want to work myself into a burnout. Although my job isn't physically demanding. A 39 h per week desk job involving counseling sessions. I have to hear a lot of stories about bad health, great misfortunes and financial problems of unemployed people, many of them with serious health issues preventing them to find regular and physically demanding jobs. And for desk job they lack the proper education. So I have to get away from this for several days to keep my sanity.

My working week is usually the early 40hours per week and being salaried I don't get paid extra for doing more hours. We work to live, I don't want to start feeling as if I am living to work.

 

[Spot's Meow]

I don't think it's quite as simple to say type A personalities want to get the job done. I likely lean more towards type B but that doesn't mean I don't want to get my work down in the quickest and easiest manner as possible so I can have more free time to do the stuff I want to do.

I didn't mean to imply that only A-type personalities want to get the job done. But I have seen those who are perfectionists stay late to get something just right, when in the long run it wasn't going to make much difference and their personal time should have been more valuable. Those in our office who are more laid back aren't necessarily doing that. They do a lot of great work for their 8 hours and then they go home. I do think that in general the U.S. culture pushes people to overwork.

 

[MacLeod]

I didn't mean to imply that only A-type personalities want to get the job done. But I have seen those who are perfectionists stay late to get something just right, when in the long run it wasn't going to make much difference and their personal time should have been more valuable. Those in our office who are more laid back aren't necessarily doing that. They do a lot of great work for their 8 hours and then they go home. I do think that in general the U.S. culture pushes people to overwork.

It would perhaps be more accurate to say type A personalities tend to be more workaholics than type B personalities, as more of a type B I will stay late to get a job when I need to, I can be a perfectionist when I need to be. It's comes down to how much more time and energy do I need to expend on this task vs the reward. Sometimes it is better to work smarter rather than harder.

As for US culture pushing people to overwork, I suspect that might be down to need rather than desire in many cases.

 

[Finn]

We don't do vacations much aside from camping and it's a hassle here in Texas with all the private lands

But we will be off to Wyoming this summer for my brother's wedding

I'll be up there few days before the missus. I really hope I get to escape for a couple of hours from my family They are fine, but they don't always understand how they can really leave me out due to my deafness and there tend to be times when I need to go "fuck it" and go somewhere else.

 

[Nyotarules]

My working week is usually the early 40hours per week and being salaried I don't get paid extra for doing more hours. We work to live, I don't want to start feeling as if I am living to work.

Best attitude to have. I work for a firm which was owned by billionaires, one died in 2003, the other 2011 and the company is still going strong without them. If my firm can survive the death of those two it can certainly do without me for 28 days a year

 

[Tom Hendricks]

We just got back from holiday at the Disney Vacation Club on Hilton Head Island. This is the first time we stayed at a DVC outside of Disneyworld or Disneyland. They didn't disappoint, we had an amazing time, with the same level of Disney customer satisfaction.

 

[Kor]

I didn't mean to imply that only A-type personalities want to get the job done. But I have seen those who are perfectionists stay late to get something just right, when in the long run it wasn't going to make much difference and their personal time should have been more valuable. Those in our office who are more laid back aren't necessarily doing that. They do a lot of great work for their 8 hours and then they go home. I do think that in general the U.S. culture pushes people to overwork.

At one of my former jobs, a manager "advised" me that if I really wanted to advance in the company, then as an hourly employee I would basically need to "volunteer" extra work hours to get more work done, without reporting it on my timesheet.

Kor

 

[Marynator]

Oh dear, isn't that illegal?

 

[UncleRogi]

Our big vacation will be to Disney World, again. I have two little kids, so it is amazing fun.

We also spend a lot of time at our summer home on Shelter Island. My husband and I do weekend getaways a few times a year various spots in New England.

As someone who has gone to Disneyworld every year for 20 years running:

it will NOT be a vacation...these days it takes military order organization,
And the number of STROLLERS will preclude any semblance to relaxation...

And never, NEVER go there in the last days of December...

A heads up....

It's NOT the same place we nostalgically remember...

Fair Warning

 

[MacLeod]

Oh dear, isn't that illegal?

I suspect forcing someone to work without pay is illegal, them "volunteering" to do extra work without pay might not be illegal.

 

[Marynator]

I'm of course not a lawyer or any legal expert, but my laywoman's thought is it's still illegal. I do know someone years ago, he told me his store encouraged employees to work off the clock and earn commissions only, and he said there was a legal case and the store was forced to pay him and everyone else back wages and had penalties. I only heard his story but it feels to me it makes so much sense, I know when I was an hourly employee my company was very strict about not letting us start early and especially not off the clock, because of legal concerns. I do feel they can't even let employees volunteer, because they could so easily be considered coercion?

 

[UncleRogi]

I will add this, to my own embarassement:

Last November I went and got pissed drunk at the Floridian. After closing the bar, (at Pop Century),
Security rousted me at 4 am, and I was escorted (not arrested) off the property,
and told I was forever banned from ANY Disney property. They have become
security conscience after Las Vegas. And they know my family gives them 10s of
thousands every year.

And good deal, Folk. That place is no longer worth the cost.

20 years and NOW they have a problem, after spending $120 on three drinks...

 

[Gryffindorian]

I suspect forcing someone to work without pay is illegal, them "volunteering" to do extra work without pay might not be illegal.

It would be against union rules, but that's assuming the employees are unionized.

 

[Sophie74656]

I just got back from a lovely long weekend trip with my boyfriend. A propper week long vacation probably won't happen until our honeymoon (not that he's even proposed yet)