In Canada the situation is similar. All around me I see people burning out, breaking down and getting sick. Why? Mostly because they're working too hard at too stressful jobs and not getting enough time off. Ask to be treated decently and you're accused of "whining?" I don't get it.

It has been said that people (Buzz excepted) so often define themselves by their jobs in this culture. Working, working, waiting for retirement to finally do what you supposedly always wanted to do, speeding around in cars, gulping down lunch, shopping, buying, mindlessly rushing to and fro - what are we doing?

Right on April! Like you said, so often people think you ARE what you DO for a living. To me that is just absurd. And yet what is the first question one inevitably gets asked by people you haven't met before when you are at a party or social activity? "And what do you do for a living?" Gawk! Robert Fulghum tells people he is a nun when they ask him that one. And then they JUDGE a person on what they answer...thus a highly paid plumber is treated as "below" that of a poorly paid professor at some minor college. A person is far more than the job they happen to hold. Or not hold in my case. I still suggest people be free of this whole job/status/vacation business and just save up as much as you can and then get OUT and travel whenever and where ever you wish as I do.

I'm over 50. I'm a doctor, but I make less than high school principals in this town, since I'm in academic medicine and work in pediatrics. I've also just been through treatment for prostatic cancer, so I've been a patient, too. Like so many others, I'm discouraged, I'm burning out and ready to leave medicine all together. I'm here to tell you that despite scientific advances, the American people are getting MUCH worse medical care than 15 or 20 years ago, and paying much more for it -- and paying mostly people who have nothing to do with medicine. When the AMA --hardly a socialist group -- comes out in favor of single payer, that should tell you something.

June's WHO stats may be subject to all kinds of interpretation, but she's right about the changes in administrative costs since private corporations took over the health care delivery system. We are getting about 60% of our money's worth, if that. In addition, it used to be the case that revenues were turned back into the system for medical research and development. Now, except for development of drugs for popular problems like allergies, it just drains out into deep pockets. I've seen kids turned away, made to suffer and -- you bet -- die because of bean-counting decisions. It's not even about who should have control here, although it is a nightmare to be talking to someone with a substandard 8th grade education who's telling me I can't do an essential procedure for a kid because it's not on page 347 in his accepted-procedures manual. Of course, if it's the CEO's kid, things are very different. What is wearing us all down is knowing America's "quality" health care is out there but deteriorating fast and available to fewer and fewer.

And without continuing training and research, by the time some of you reach middle age (when the warranty starts to run out on your parts), no amount of money is going to find a cure for what ails you.

Leave America? 1. How dare you! This country was founded on the principle of freedom to dissent. That's why we can all vote. 2. It's not really possible anyway. In some form, America reaches into most of the rest of the world except where the local government devotes full energy to trying to keep out Coke, Disney, Ford, etc., and otherwise parts of the rest of the world now own America, esp. pharmaceutical companies!

Hi BUZZ! You are sooo right about the way people treat us by our job. Also by the way we dress. When I go to the mall in my business suit I am attended to like a queen. This is exactly the opposite of the way I am treated in jeans or shorts! I'm afraid it all comes around to the extreme GREED and selfish attitudes we have developed over the last 2 decades.

Nobody is a slave to any job in the US. There are many options one has. It is all a matter of choice. If you want to take a lot of time off then be a temp or contract worker. I have no sympathy whatsoever for the whiners and complainers. If you don't like your situation then improve it.

There is absolutely no question at all that health care in the US is the highest quality in the world. Maybe the distribution system could be improved a bit. However socialized systems such as in Canada and elsewhere are NOT the answer. I hvae many reltives that live in Canada and can cite several examples of very long waits to get needed surgery etc. One relative has a young daughter that had to wait for 5 months for a needed operation that was actually quite minor. I have an aunt that would have had to wait over a year for a hip replacement. She ended up by getting it done in the US. Another relative had to wait for 7 months for heart bypass surgery. There would have been no more that a couple of days wait, if any, in the US. There are more CAT scan machines in San Diego than in all of Canada. I am not really intending to pick on Canada so please excuse me if it seems like it. It is just that I am familiar with their system.

And it seems to be getting worse by the minute, Cal. Some doctors, here in BC anyway, are getting fed up and leaving, which leaves the remaining doctors with more patients to deal with and on and on it goes.

So they may not be slaves to their jobs or at least the location of their jobs, but where does that leave us? Sorry, but I'd rather they take a stand... or whine as you call it... than jump ship.(By the way, for those who think health care in Canada is free, it's not.)

Ruth : Actually I dont quite understand the unemployment rate argument. Unemployment in the UK runs at 3.7% - Junes figures I think, whereas I believe rates over the US were on average 4% for the same period. Yet here in the UK I get 5 weeks holiday per year with 10 days public holidays. True my wage as a nurse is not as much as it would be in the US, but it is reasonable and I can afford to travel whenever and wherever I want (coming back to a large Visa bill sometimes though!).

The US State Department reports unemployment statistics for most modern industrialized nations. I believe that the UK is consistently between 9 and 10 percent, although I'm not absolutely certain about this.

Anyone that feels they don't have enough vacation time should do the following excercise: 1) Take the extra number of weeks that you would like and subtract the corresponding amount of salary from your annual income. If you currently are allowed two weeks and you would like five, subtract three weeks salary. 2) Compare your adjusted annual income to the average take-home (it is important to adjust for taxes) income of the average citizen of the European Union. These figures are available on the internet, I've seen them but I can't remember where.

Assuming that your salary is somewhere near the median US value, you will find that taking unpaid leave still leaves you better off financially than the average European who gets paid for their five week vacation. You might be surprised at the number of supervisors that will allow unpaid leave, particularly if the value you as an employee.

Steve, you are a little out I am afraid. Unemployment here in the UK is as I said 3.7% as of June/July 2000 based on the number of claimants.

Not to be argumentative Angela, but I don't think anyone's quibbling about unemployment rate differences of 0.3%. The earlier reference was to countries with unemployment rates of 10-20% or more, in which you see a multitude of other social/economic problems.

In the grand scheme of things, you have to strike a balance among average work hours, average wage, vacation time, benefits, taxes, federal benefits (what you get back from your taxes), freedoms, safety, environmental quality, security and the like.
How does one measure overall quality of life from one country to another? I don't know of a way. When I've visited France, Italy, UK, Australia most of the people I've encountered were fiercely proud of their respective countries and wouldn't trade them, it seems, for another. And that's what really counts in the end, right? How happy a country's people are with their individual lives.
Travelling provides wonderful opportunities to compare and contrast. I always find little things about each country that I find more desirable than in my own. Broadens my perspective. Makes me appreciate my own culture more, as well as that of others.

If more people travelled I think there'd be less prejudice, more understanding, fewer wars. So maybe in addition to Al Gore mandating more vacation, he should mandate overseas travel for everyone! (kidding, of course).

Of course those taxes in Europe do pay for five weeks' vacation, free (meaning no premiums) healthcare, good public transportation, etc. Theirs is a different way of life.

Cal, it's funny you should tell people who want time off to take temp or consulting jobs after going on about the superior healthcare in the US, since temp and consulting work comes, almost all the time, sans benefits like healthcare and pension, and in the HMO era, indpendent health care plans are prohibitively expensive for most. Not all of us have stock options to cash in.

Thanks for that Kevin, but I meant that the unemployment rate in UK was 3.7% as opposed to the 9-10% that Steve had previously mentioned as being the UK rate which it perhaps was, but many years ago now. I wasn't quibbling over the 0.3% difference between UK and US, sorry if that was unclear!
Do agree with you that travel broadens our perspectives and (hopefully) makes us more appreciative of other cultures and how we can learn from them.

Unemployment figures are tricky things, and shouldn't be blindly compared from country to country. While Angela is correct that the official UK unemployment rate was 3.7% for June/July, it is not calculated the same way as it is in the US (in fact, the UK government has changed the calculation 32 times between 1979 and 1997).

A better comparison would be to use the official International Labour Organisation (ILO) rate of 5.5%.

Both of these are very low numbers historically.

For anyone interested, the comparable ILO rate for the rest of the EU is 9.1%.

Angela,

I'm not sure about the UK, but inferring unemployment rates from claimant statistics is unreliable in the US. When benefits run out, people stop reporting to the unemployment office.

I checked the US State Department website and they are reporting that as recently as 1998 unemployment in the UK was around 9 percent. If you now have a national umemployment rate of 4%, Blair must be doing an incredible job.

The UK unemployment rate last reported by the US State Department was actually 7.9%. I was a bit careless because I was in a hurry. The near 9% value was actually for 1995. My mistake.

Brian, I agree that employment statistics are much more complex than most people realize (e.g., at what age do you start counting?, at what age do you stop counting?, do you only include people that want to work?, what about students?, etc.). But it is not totally meaningless to compare unemployment statistics as long as they are compiled by the same source using the same guidelines (e.g., US State Department).

Steve ...you said "Blair must be doing an incredible job", as I nurse I cannot totally agree with that!! but he has certainly reduced unemployment. Although, as you said claimant rates can be misleading. I also went to the US State dept web site and saw 1999 figures quoted as 4.8% - again this was based on claimants. But this figure has continued to fall this year which is a good thing.

Brian..
I know that this is really going off the topic again but just out of interest what are the official ILO unemployment rates for the US?

Admittedly, it wouldn't surprise me if the US State Department was reporting inconsistent UK unemployment figures - it is a US federal agency.

Still, the discrepancy seems awfully large (a factor of two). My numbers are from the US State Department Bureau of European Affairs. The URL is http://www.state.gov/www/issues/econ...kingdom97.html. The State Department's most recent unemployment statistics for the European Union as a whole is about 10%.

Steve
I found the 1999 US state dept. statistics on UK unemployment from >http://www.state.gov/www/about_state...e/uk99_02html<
And the July2000 figure from national press/news ect.

I agree with the poster who complains about topics like this bringing out the extremists.
Holidays are a vital part of the working scene. I am much more likely to give my best after I have been revived by a well-earned break, and I am sure most others are too.
America, to me, is disappointingly behind the times when it comes to vacation time. As well as your having to pay $$$ for health insurance, you are then expected to slave for 50 weeks a year.
In the U K, I get 26 days including public holidays, of which there are about 7 per year. In addition to that, I work a non-standard rota pattern that allows me an average of a 4 day week with 7 days off every six weeks. Night and weekend work is involved, but I knew that when I went to work in the industry.
Each year I save and travel to four or five foreign places, and that is without earning mega-bucks. If I had to live in the U S, I would not be quite as productive, I fear, and nor would I be quite so well off.
Sure, your economy is booming, but ours isn't not doing so badly and inflation and unemployment is low, as are interest rates.