As small point but there is no such thing as “eurozone labour laws”. Each country has its own; ranging from job security for life (France) to close to US hire and fire policies (UK).There are some EU wide laws regarding discrimination and so on, but that’s about it.

What I find interesting is that there doesn’t seem to be any great demand for longer holibobs from the USA. In Britain the statutory minimum leave is two weeks, but if any employer offered that level of leave no one would apply for the job. Four weeks is the generally accepted minimum here. There’s also no correlation between salary and holiday levels. As I said, I’m a local government drone and our salaries are at least as good as the private sector (but don’t tell anyone – we like moaning about them), and our holiday entitlement is better than pretty much anyone else.

Also I’m amazed that you have to use your time off for sickies. Here we just put it down to sick leave, and you keep your holidays. (There is a long and honourable British tradition of “throwing a sickie” when you can’t face work and would rather spend the morning in bed and the afternoon in the pub. Employers tacitly accept this)

David has a point - if people just wouldn't accept low paying/not enough vacation/no health benefit jobs, then employers would have to pony up and provide benefits to be competitive. You make your own destiny.

Angela,

I'm in the same boat as you. 10 days a year to cover all my needs.

My employer generously allows me to take time off without pay in addition to my 10 paid days which allows me to visit family over the holidays and still travel. I'm currently averaging 10 unpaid days a year.

David, "chucking a sickie" is indeed an honourable tradition that you may be assured has been maintained by Her Majesty's faithful subjects in the Antipodes.

GR, I wasn't trying to tell Americans how they should be doing things. My point related to what options are open to Europeans, there being middle ways (instance Australia and it seems the UK and Canada) which are neither a job-for-life security blanket nor an "every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost" system.

As someone pointed out, European governments retain power over their national employment conditions, and while Australia has relatively few people there are European countries with fewer (eg Belgium, Netherlands, Portugal). And we have to deal with a clumsy 3-tier system of government that seemed like a good idea when we borrowed it from the US but which is now outdated, wasteful and dysfunctional. But I can't see that raw population numbers are the issue.

I do accept that for a number of reasons, including perhaps regional diversity, state governments' fear of discouraging investment and the traditional American distrust of government, reform would be a very difficult challenge in the US.

I get 21 days for paid holidays a year, and get paid if i'm off sick once I have a Doctors note to confirm

I've worked at my company for four years, and I get 15 paid vacation days (3 work weeks) and four personal days. I think it goes up to four weeks paid vacation after 10 years.

In the US... I have been with the organization for 1.5 yrs. I have 25 days of PTO and 10 holidays. I can roll over 10 days. :) I know I am very lucky and will probably stay in this job a long time!

When I had a "real" job with a small company, I had only 2 weeks of vacation and felt like it was all spent with my children at the doctor's office or stuck in traffic. I said goodbye to before care, after care, summer camps and pantyhose. I also said goodbye to the really nice car, larger house, etc. I am now self employed and I am giving myself 5 weeks of vacation this year. The kids love it too.

Keep in mind that some people have jobs that they really enjoy doing--lucky stiffs!

Mrs. Fly is one of those--she really looks forward to the school year and her little students (3-5 year olds). I have to pressure her to use the personal days she is allotted during the school year.

I have had jobs like that over my work career--really looked forward to going to the office. The pay was like a lucky windfall bonus.

I'm in the US and have 3 weeks vacation, I managed to get another week unpaid and am going to Montenegro and Croatia for 4 weeks this summer. Nobody at my company seems to take more than 2 weeks at a time, so I consider myself lucky.

i am in the US and a teacher with a traditional school year so I get the whole summer off. The bummer is my DH only gets 3 weeks for the year, so sometimes the kids and I go without him. We spread his 3 weeks out throughout the year such as Christmas, Easter, and 1 week in summer. I love my summers!

I don't get enough vacation time. It's 3:30 a.m. here in NYC, and I am writing a brief for court for a case that will probably settle - after I work another 6 months worth of 80-hour weeks. In return, I officially have 4 weeks vacation. In the 12 years I have been practicing law, I have never been able to use all of my time...

On the other hand, I'm leaving for Germany and World Cup matches in 3 weeks - and I intend to make sure that my Blackberry does not work during that time frame!

So glad I'm not American :-)

28 days annual leave + 12 days public holidays + paid sick leave.

I'm in the U.S. I currently get four weeks of vacation, six sick days, eight paid holidays, and one "personal day" per year. Of course it took me ten years to earn that fourth week of vacation per year! I'll start getting a fifth one in two more years (on my 15th anniversary with the company). Lately, we've been getting an extra two days of vacation per year because the company can't afford to give us Christmas bonuses anymore.