66% of Americans say they want extended European-style vacation policies at work

I was born and educated in Scotland, worked in the UK for a decade or so, then moved to the US and worked for big tech for 15 years while living in the US and becoming a US citizen. I then chose to move back to Scotland, where I continue to work for the same US big tech company but get paid UK wages with UK employment benefits. So, I've lived significant portions of my life on both sides.

Here in the UK, I get 29 days paid vacation plus ten or so (not sure) public holidays. If I am sick on vacation, I can claim those days as sick days and regain the vacation time. Edit: plus, my contract is for 35 hours per week whereas in the US it was 40.

Regarding money, I am doing the same job that I was doing in the US (same team etc.) but took, what was at the time, a 25% reduction in gross salary. However, by the time you add in the higher taxes, my take home pay (from my salary - my stock awards are the same) is about 40% lower than it was in the US.

Now, I am nearing 50, my corporate career progression is plateauing/settled (by choice, btw) and I have a teenage daughter. A big reason for coming back to Scotland was so she could be educated here and experience European life and culture during her formative years. The other big reason was to have a better work-life balance. I have so much non-work time here, I can actually pursue non-work interests; whereas my US work colleagues seem to always be Slacking and "checking in" while they are on vacation; never seeming to have an identity beyond their job.

I have also lost 13kg (29lb) in weight.

For us techies, the US is the place to get rich, but, in my experience, there are significant lifestyle compromises that you must make in order to do so.

Edit: I was curious about the numbers, so I did a little arithmetic to work out the hourly wage I earned in the US and the hourly wage I earn here in the UK, taking into consideration the vacation days.

My UK gross per hour wage is between 11% and 15% lower than my US salary, depending on the (volatile) exchange rate. Of course, UK tax is much higher (my marginal rate is 49%). So, the difference in take-home pay is more than that.

Yes, but my employer can fire me (in some cases) if I am sick for more than 30 days in a year.

https://www.wirtschaftsforum.de/tipps/welche-anzahl-an-krank...

The comment I replied to did not mention tuition costs. The claim was that incomes can be low because there is not cost for letting students study. And the costs are absolutely there.

The fact that some of the best US universities have outrageous tuition is neither new nor surprising nor does it invalidate my claim. I drew no comparison to the US, you are drawing that comparison.

We not only have a better life expectancy (6years for men?), we also have a better 'good health' expectancy.

Economic growth is stagnant because energy production and energy import are stagnant. This has little to do with policy. It's 2011 all over again, when we heard all sort of 'southern Europeans are lazy/corrupt' and other shit. I even bought it like a good child. No. Southern Europeans economies used to depend a lot on north sea and Sahara oil and gas, and the reserves (and production) started declining in 2008 and 2010 respectively. Only oil producers, Russian clients and 'nuclear-based' economies managed to avoid crisis.

What is funny now that everybody speak about how Germany economy is in crisis. Well yeah. Same causes, same consequences.

I really don't see how it seems no one gets it. I understand politics wanting to grandstand and explain how growth is caused their policies, but I mean, the data is available. And we have panda. Look at oil import data from Italy then look at growth, from 2010 to 2012,its obvious one of the two is driving the other. Check the other 'PIGS', it's the same.

>If you burn out your employees

Burn out in Europe is still omnipresent and rising these days. This includes Germany, the 'chosen child' every proponent points at in these discussions. A few weeks off barely makes a dent in this and vacation days / time off hasn't been that noticeably different since the 70s/80s.

>Japan

That's just a law that pushes them to use it and keeps companies from going 'ah yeah difficult'. It's barely anything when work culture chains employees down to the whims of employers, or risking to be seen as dysfunctional for trying to get out of that 'I belong to my company' trap.

Surprise, that's the same culture that exists in most EU-countries. Just less hardcore.