Monday, February 09, 2015

Why won't Japanese workers go on vacation?

Japan is poised to force workers to take at least five days of paid vacation a year, a compromise between employers' groups calling for three and labor unions that wanted eight. Everyone in the country seems to agree that it's critical workers take their legally guaranteed vacation time, because not only are Japanese people not having sex, they're also refusing to take a break from the grind—and it's becoming an economic and health crisis.

Under Japan's Labor Standards Law, employees are entitled to at least ten days of paid annual leave per year, with one extra day per year worked until the employee reaches a 20-day-a-year cap. The average employee in 2013 was entitled to 18.5 vacation days and received 15 days off for national holidays. That's already the second lowest amount of vacation among the world's wealthiest nations—behind only the United States, with our ten federal holidays and lack of (federally) guaranteed paid leave.

Perhaps most surprising is that less than half of Japanese folks took their full vacation allotment in 2013, with the typical worker claiming only nine of an available 18.5 vacation days. One in six workers took none.

 By comparison, the average French worker receives at least 37 legally guaranteed days of paid leave per year and uses 93 percent of them, figures that are similar to those of most other European nations. Full story...

Related posts:
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  2. Karoshi or overwork, Japan's silent killer...
  3. France's 35-hour work week is scrapped...
  4. Poll: 78% of U.S. workers feel burned out...
  5. The world's hardest working countries. Insane!!
  6. The little girl, her dad's day off and Google...

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