PTO = Paid time off, apparently.
also known as personal time off in some regions
Vacations in the Soviet Union
31–40 of 422 posts
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#32[flagged]
The delta is very much _not_ negligible. Even people’s apartments were not in their property. No private business allowed, all production was government-managed. It is difficult to understand how USSR worked, unless you lived there.
Vast numbers of people in the West don't own their own home either. Not really the same as living in the old East since you can choose where you live here, within your budget, but I wanted to highlight that a lot of our freedom ends when the money does.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#33Happy May Day! Here's a Twitter thread [0] that has excerpts/paraphrases from an old Soviet pamphlet called "How Soviet Workers Spend Their Leisure." (rolled up version [1]) You can find a scanned version of the pamphlet here [2]. There were many of these pamphlets published. One day I will scan them and post them. There was one on Waterways & Transport in the USSR, one about Soviet theater, one about the food indust…
Prolonged periods of time spent without obligation to work for pay is one of the greatest luxuries you can have in this life. People shouldn't have to wait until retirement to enjoy it. Sabbatical, basically, although even sabbatical often comes with obligations for self-improvement serving the company offering it. A lot of discourse on working hours revolves around decreasing the hours worked per week. I would also…
> What is all this wealth and automation and productivity growth for, then?
Why, more wealth and automation and productivity growth to no end of course.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#34> In the West, what you do when you leave the office was and is your own business. In the USSR, it was everyone else’s. Is this actually true? In Germany at least, vacation from work is not truly our own time. We are legally required to use it to relax and restore our capacity for future work. Few people probably see it that way, admittedly. Of course, there is still a huge difference, but it's awkward to view everyt…
What do you mean "legally required"? E.g. is there a law that says that specifically, or a common interpretation of a law that says something vaguer, or a common clause in employment contracts, or were you being metaphorical and it isn't actually legal?
I'm from the US, and this sounds very strange to my ears.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#35The Soviet Union's approach to paid time off (PTO) was unique, as it not only provided workers with time off but also determined how they spent it, often with groups of strangers instead of friends and family. This policy aimed to promote the collective as the most important social unit and provided subsidized vacations to a select number of workers. Although Soviet vacations initially served as team-building exercis…
[flagged]
That is quite the stretch to think those situations are "a bit [a]like".
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#36> In the West, what you do when you leave the office was and is your own business. In the USSR, it was everyone else’s. Is this actually true? In Germany at least, vacation from work is not truly our own time. We are legally required to use it to relax and restore our capacity for future work. Few people probably see it that way, admittedly. Of course, there is still a huge difference, but it's awkward to view everyt…
>We are legally required to use it to relax and restore our capacity for future work.
Well that's an interesting bit of trivia. Can you share anything more about it? Just for my own amusement and the amusement of people I will relate it to in the future, I would love to read whatever dry legal code sets that in writing.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#37Happy May Day! Here's a Twitter thread [0] that has excerpts/paraphrases from an old Soviet pamphlet called "How Soviet Workers Spend Their Leisure." (rolled up version [1]) You can find a scanned version of the pamphlet here [2]. There were many of these pamphlets published. One day I will scan them and post them. There was one on Waterways & Transport in the USSR, one about Soviet theater, one about the food indust…
Prolonged periods of time spent without obligation to work for pay is one of the greatest luxuries you can have in this life. People shouldn't have to wait until retirement to enjoy it. Sabbatical, basically, although even sabbatical often comes with obligations for self-improvement serving the company offering it. A lot of discourse on working hours revolves around decreasing the hours worked per week. I would also…
This is an interesting idea — there could be a sabbatical accrual of sorts.
One way this could realistically work today (with a lot of kicking and screaming about how it’ll ruin the economy) is each year of work earns a month of sabbatical, and once you’ve earned at least 2 months you can exercise your sabbatical rights, given some notice.
Companies could cap it at 6 months at a time so you don’t completely lose track of changes at work.
We could even make up to 2 months transferable between companies, and if you’re ever fired you can choose how or if you’d like to be paid out. That would help discourage retaliation against using the time, in addition to making it illegal.
I don’t see a reason that we couldn’t pass a law tomorrow that does this. Sure the economy would slow a bit, but what a giant quality-of-life gain it would be. And maybe it would actually make the economy grow faster in the long term if it encourages more private innovation.
But we already accept this idea for parental leave, this would be the same thing without the need for having a baby.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#38It's fascinating how the ideology of Marxism–Leninism (Communism) today is more popular than ever among young people in former capitalist heartlands like the US, Canada and UK.
A simple European-style welfare state with universal healthcare is all you need to satisfy 90% of people but the elites in the US and the UK refuse to provide that.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#39Happy May Day! Here's a Twitter thread [0] that has excerpts/paraphrases from an old Soviet pamphlet called "How Soviet Workers Spend Their Leisure." (rolled up version [1]) You can find a scanned version of the pamphlet here [2]. There were many of these pamphlets published. One day I will scan them and post them. There was one on Waterways & Transport in the USSR, one about Soviet theater, one about the food indust…
Did the Soviet government actually follow the Constitution of The USSR? I believe it also mentioned freedom of expression, freedom of religion and freedom of assembly, all of which seemed to be ignored.
Re: Vacations in the Soviet Union
#40PTO = Paid time off, apparently.
Huh. Is that not common vernacular where you're from?
> Huh. Is that not common vernacular where you're from?
I don’t know about the parent commenter, but I am of the opinion that regardless of how common an abbreviation is, it should always be expanded, unless the circumstances prevent you from doing that. Here, in Hacker News, submissions must have a title with maximum 80 characters, but look at this:
30 characters -> Workers of the World, Take PTO
46 characters -> Workers of the World, Take Paid Time Off (PTO)
Wouldn’t you prefer to err on the side of caution and expand abbreviations whenever possible? Particularly in contexts where the audience may not be familiar with the abbreviation or where clarity is particularly important. I believe that expanding abbreviations is a simple but effective way to demonstrate inclusiveness and promote greater understanding and participation in communication, especially in multicultural contexts, like Hacker News, where different people have different levels of familiarity with certain terms.