Thursday, July 05, 2007

Happy Really Short Vacation, Everybody

"The United States is in a class of its own," the report says. "It is the no-vacation nation."
A report from the European Trade Union Institute points out that Americans get very little vacation time relative to other developed nations. Combine this with the reticence towards overtime pay, worker's rights, and insurance benefits, and you've got a nation of working people squeezed from all sides.

I'm in a rather luxurious position. Academics have plenty of time off and can work on their own projects much of the time. But this has changed in academia too as universities think more and more like businesses. Some universities and university departments are so strapped for money that they become overly conservative about project with great academic merit but that bring in little funding. Basically, many are starting to have to pay their own way to work in universities through combinations of grants and adjunct-type pay. Vacation, in this sense, ends up meaning very little when the time you do have that is free of formal obligations is entirely consumed with trying to survive over the next couple of years. This system is going to break.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

where's the fruit pix?

Anonymous said...

From this report and this theme:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/015020.php
It is clear that the way to fight terrorism is to take more vacations. Vacation time = less stress = less medical issues = less need for doctors = fewer terrorists entering the country.

It is good to see that academics are doing their part to reduce terror by having time off.

-joseph b.

helmut said...

Yeah, well, I don't have any income during the summer, which makes for slim pickings in the vacation department.