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HOLIDAY TIME

Should Three Weeks' Paid Vacation Be Legally Required?

A petition everyone can agree on?

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by Mary Noble

Senior Editor t

Image: zastavski.com

This might be that rare thing, a petition all Americans can agree on. Or perhaps not - if you're an employer.

A petition to the White House is calling for a mandatory minimum of three weeks paid vacation. Launched on Saturday Dec 21, it's already received 5,000 signatures, so it's one fifth of the way to receiving an official White House response.

(In case anyone wants to keep track of which petitions are now scheduled for a White House response - they include the Texas petition to secede, and several petitions to declare the Westboro Baptist Church a hate group.)

America is the only country among the world's 21 wealthiest nations without any paid vacation time enforced by law. In Britain, workers get 4 weeks. And as the petition points out, Germans managed to keep up a successful economy while enjoying upwards of 6 weeks paid vacation, mandated by law.

Via the White House petitions site.
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Comments (view in Forum)

  • PoliticalSpice
    !
    I think we need four weeks, but since it would be sticker shock to employers would like to phase it in gradually. Also feel the govt. should give most back in the form of employer tax refund. As a self employed person this would not benefit me, but we need to move in this general direction, and need single payer or national healthcare, not the romney style plan that has us forking money over to insurance corporations.
  • dances-weebles
    !
    here where i live the vacation time is 4 weeks mandatory paid time off, except for domestic workers who receive three weeks. not only that, but since the wage and salary systems work on a monthly pay cycle, at the end of every year all employees receive a 13th salary mandatory...+ any holiday or profit sharing bonuses...

    and guess what. neither the economy, nor profits are suffering one bit. in fact, general motors of brasil is the only segment of the country that ALWAYS registers a hefty profit right along with all other major manufacturers.

    (and we have socialised medicine which works hand in hand with any (affordable) health care providers that anyone wishes to pay for)
  • Heavy-Fed
    !
    I've got a better idea, why not 52 weeks of paid vacation a year funded in the form of an employer tax refund? Yeah! That makes sense!!! NOTHING IS FREE IN LIFE... SOMEONE HAS TO PAY FOR IT!!! IF YOU WANT EXTRA VACATION... PAY FOR IT... DON'T MAKE ME THE TAXPAYER PAY FOR IT!!!!
  • PoliticalSpice
    !
    @Heavy-Fed Aside from the exaple provided directly a top your post, most western european countries have laws like this. You beleive in free market capitalism, I do not. But if this ever comes to pass no one will force you to stop working.
  • dances-weebles
    !
    @Heavy-Fed why is it with all you folks that you seem to believe that vacation time is paid for by the taxpayer or the gov't.
    are you all stuck on stupid?
  • MongoAPillager
    !
    @dances-weebles so as usual the american taxpayer is footing the bill,Hello,GM Bailout.once again socialism works at the expense of the American taxpayer!!
  • View all 16 replies >
  • Rocker
    !
    A lot of the larger employers already pay that benefit and more so that's moot. The smaller employers may be strained to do so. Application of common sense here but not it would not be a requirement. Heck, tie it to Obamacare for employers of 110 employees or over as one of the rules for example. But not across the board for every employer.
  • martydotcom
    !
    Rocker size has nothing to do with it if you want outstanding employees. My wife's employer. prior to being taken over by IBM, had the philosophy that we spend a fortune developing and training our employees and the competition will steal them. To prevent employees from leaving everyone was offered a 3 month sabbatical at full pay,(six weeks at double pay) available every 5th year anniversary. In addition to two weeks vacation after year one. This tech startup had 15 people when she joined and that was how they attracted the best personnel available.
    We traveled round the world, literally at their expense. In 1985 and 1990 a round the world airline ticket was ~$2000.00 unlimited stops
  • Rocker
    !
    @martydotcom - Congratulations for you and your wife. There are some very outstanding companies out there that values their employees and offer the bennies to keep them. That's what most benefits were developed for in the beginning. There aren't enough corporate institutions out there that practice that philosophy much any more. They really are 'the company you keep' to coin an ad blurb.
  • u
    CommonSense
    !
    So, then let's give more subsidies to small business. Sometimes government regulations do have too much of an impact on small businesses. The solution is not to not have the regulation, the solution is to give small business a leg up. Small business is already in trouble, and the current Republican Party is no help to them even though it pretends it is.
    That's the legitimate reason for subsidies, no large corporation should be getting subsidies, they do not need them.
    If small business owners would realize there interests are in fact opposed to that of large business and organize and fund and campaign accordingly, asking for subsidies and tax cuts that only go to small business instead of benefits for all businesses that helps the large businesses to effectively shut out small business, maybe this country could turn around. Maybe this will force the Republican Party to go back to its roots of being on the side of small business instead of large business and we'll actually see progressive Republican candidates again. There are a number of issues the Democratic Party won't touch right now because 1. their donors wouldn't like it. and 2. They don't have to, because people have no one else to vote for. I think real progressives should register as Republicans and run in races that would otherwise be uncontested Democratic races. As people realize the conservative Republican promise that just letting the superrich have free reign would mean prosperity for all clearly isn't working the party will continue to shrink down to a fringe of the superrich and religious fundamentalists. As that shrinking happens it presents a window for dissatisfied progressive activists to enter the party in large enough numbers to take it over. This is what political scientists call Realignment. I predict in the future the Republicans will be the left-wing party, the Democrats will be the right-wing party and without the Democrats even having to change any of their positions on the issues to the right. The Democrats will stay roughly where they are now, and the Republican Party will become the leftists.
  • Rocker
    !
    @CommonSense - Interesting concept. I don't know if it would go so far as a Repub leftist move tho in terms of platform. Still, all in all, I believe a 're-allignment' is going to be in order. Being a Blue Dog Dem for some time myself, I have seen the Dems fragmented pretty badly but never the Repubs. As diverse as the US has become, the old times have pretty much gone for good and new strategy is called for. I agree with your small business assessment.
  • u
    seedtick
    !
    Most employers have a vacation benefit. Everyone qualifies for a one week vacation after some period of time...usually 6 months or a year. Some employers are more generous and that may increase over time to a month each year. Hell, a vacation is a benefit, not a right. The amount of vacation you get is an incentive to stay with an employer after you are trained and valuable to the operation.
    And, with all that said, not every employer can afford to give paid vacations. And, if you force long vacation benefits upon employers, they will only hire part time workers or cut down the number of full time employees they have to give vacations to.
  • dances-weebles
    !
    1 week time off isn't enough. everyone should receive 4 weeks mandatory paid time off... including part time employees.

    tell me something... is one week enough time to take a cruise, or to travel to europe (or any other foreign destination) very few middle class brasilian families would even think of staying home for their vacation or camping out, sleeping on the ground, in a local park.
  • u
    seedtick
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    @dances-weebles Lots of luck...that is what Europeans thought for years. Now, look at the situation there. We see riots in the streets when the "benefits" are taken away.
  • u
    seedtick
    !
    @dances-weebles I thought about this a little more, Weebles. Thirty years ago Brasil had no middle class. There were only two classes, rich or poor...the government was a military controlled democracy. The people were free to do as they pleased but they were constantly going thru military checkpoints as the entered or left cidades or crossed from one estado to another. How well you lived depended upon where you were and who you knew.
    Then the military relinquished power to civilian democratic rule. But, crime went off the charts and people struggled. Then came the petroleo boom. Everyone began to do better and a middle class has emerged and thrived. But, corruption is now the biggest problem and it reaches from top to bottom...almost like a way of life.
    Recently, the large corporation my son works for fired the entire executive management team in their Brasilian operation because of corruption. These people were Brasilians and Argentinians. The executive management team is now entirely expat. American, Canadian, and European. The middle management team is Brasilian.
    With all that said, it is high time that the new laws protecting employee rights for the labor class people were implemented. This is not the case in the USA, The standard of living is great...but Americans tend to pay more for homes and personal conveniences. American also enjoy a better infrastructure. I only hope that Brasil does not go too far toward social benefits and stifle the economy.
  • View all 17 replies >
  • dances-weebles
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    @DerivePI many companies in the u.s. already give turkey for thanksgiving and for christmas also. here it's for christmas, new years and easter + chocolate eggs for easter for all employees.
  • hwyangel
    !
    @DerivePI

    LOL, and don't forget the free cookie, juice box drink, and nappy time! Oh, and a sticky star for the back of my hand too.
  • View all 13 replies >
  • Jeff_Woehrle
    !
    Worth noting that many countries where people voted themselves four day work weeks are looking for bailouts for their empty treasuries. Why not add another entitlement to the mix right here?

    Unions in America are of declining influence, so I'm not surprised some would try to legislate union demands. Such has the mentality become in this country.

    Hey, why not? It's free! Nobody will have to pay for all that paid time, it's free money!
  • DomesticG
    !
    My biggest objection to this: It is not the place of the Federal Government to be mandating how many weeks an employer should or should not be giving an employer. Leave this decision to the state local level where it belongs.
  • Rocker
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    It could be left up to the states but it would probably be amended to the Fair Labor Standards Act with the 40 hr work week, 8 hr days, and overtime and minimum wage topics.
  • DomesticG
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    @NormalFlora You either sorely underestimate or are poorly educated about the benefits of a free market on employment.
  • Keyjo
    !
    @DomesticG
    "Free market." In other words where employers, employ as few as possible for as little as possible to do the work of two, or even three people, until they drop. Then kick them to the curb.
  • View all 21 replies >
  • Thunderchicken
    !
    And because everyone's done it, we should too? Not really sound reasoning here. America didn't become the powerhouse that we once were by following what everyone else did. Too bad we seem to have lost that drive.
  • Bobolinsky
    !
    More than 5,000? That's impressive...

    "More than 32,000 people have signed the petition on the White House website calling on Obama to deport Morgan over his support for new gun control laws after the Connecticut elementary school shootings."
    http://www.usatoday.com/story/theoval/2012/12...

    "A petition on the White House website seeking to extend travel restrictions to Russian lawmakers who proposed to ban the adoption of Russian orphans in the U.S. surpassed 25,000 signatures, triggering a review."
    http://newyork.newsday.com/news/world/white-h...

    It's doing better than these two though...

    "Two petitions at the White House web site demand that the NRA be designated a terrorist organization... Neither petition has attracted many signatures. One has collected 17 signatures out of the 25,000 needed for White House action, and the other has garnered five."
    http://www.examiner.com/article/white-house-p...
  • Bobolinsky
    !
    I've never worked anywhere that didn't have vacation time after the person has been there for a period of time. Most offer vacation time starting at 1 year of employment... PAID vacation time. I've taken time off during the first year at a job... But I didn't get paid. That's the deal. Even unskilled labor jobs offer paid vacation at least within the first 5 years.

    So who is actually losing out on vacations?

    The people who can't stay at one job long enough to accrue vacation days like all the rest of us who work somewhere large enough to have an official "vacation policy"... And the people who work for a business so small that they have escaped the wrath of the class warrior so far...

    Are any of these people going to be helped by mandatory vacation when both the small businesses and low-wage labor employees either go out of business or constrict hiring?
  • texas_cutie75
    !
    With the way the economy is at this point in time I think this is just going to make things worse. Most employers that are able to provide this, already do.
  • o
    woodtick57
    !
    I kind of like the idea of putting in a few years with the company before any paid vacation kicks in. Put in your time, then you get the bennies.
  • o
    Sharpshooter
    !
    Great idea unless you're the one cutting the check to pay someone to NOT work. I'm NOT Barack Obama and I can't write checks on money I don't have and don't have professional propagandists to explain to the bank how my kids will cover the debt.

    Three Weeks paid vacation..... I'll consider discussing this further as soon as the Idiot in Chief agrees to limiting himself to the same number.
  • o
    Coolvoter
    !
    Is love more time off work, but I don't think anyone should be forced to give that time by law. Let the states decide this and it just may work
  • raven2099
    !
    ANY VACATION TIME SHOULD BE MANDATORY AND PAID FOR....
    AND ALL WAGES SHOULD BE FROSE AT $20 AN HOUR WITHALL PRICES AND TAXES FROSEN TOO SO EVERYONE EARNS AND PAYS THE SAME FOR EVERYTHING....

    Exteamist ideas sometimes do rock...
  • John_Matrix
    !
    When the hell do people stop looking to the government for more handouts. I like paid time off as the next guy but the government has no place mandating something like this. Ideas like this are a joke.
  • Your_Name_Here
    !
    Another case of government mandated welfare. Vacation goes up which necessitates increases in prices which carries across to everyone so in effect everyone is subsidizing the vacation. I guess the best way to allow a demand economy to function flawlessly is to try and change it every chance you get. I thin common sense in government should be legally required. That would sure open up a lot of jobs.
  • u
    IMAQT
    !
    What is really scary here is not the subject of required pay vacations, but the number of people that support government policies that burden the very employers we need for economic prosperity. You want better benefits, better pay, longer vacations? Become more valuable to your employer. Is there no end to what you think the role of our federal government should be?
  • jessejaymes
    !
    I find it interesting that the criteria for an "acceptable vacation" is "going abroad" for one. Personally, after having vacationed in 27 countries I find it exhausting to vacation abroad every year and we finally took one year out of two to simply stay home and relax.

    I also find it absurd that someone would claim that even part time employees should get 4 weeks vacation. Teenagers and college age students burn through jobs as though they are what they actually are. A means to an end. To have money coming in to supplement what they are actually doing that matters to them in life. I ran my own business for 30 years and I assure you it would be a freezing, polar cap type of day in hell before I gave 4 weeks vacation to a kid who works 12 hours a week and needs time off for school events, has little to no skills, and poor work ethic. In your dreams.
  • Thegrif
    !
    We don't always see eye to eye, but on this issue, I agree. Part time means part of the time they already are on vacation.
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