Re: 8+Tabling Americans And 4 Tabling Europeans
The problem for Americans is that there is basically no market for vacation time. Wages may be set by the market by and large, but vacation time is set by cultural norms and is very inflexible. There are very few jobs where you can negotiate more vacation time in exchange for a lower wage. I'm not really sure why this is, but it is unfortunate.
More and more, Americans are forced to work more than 40 hours a week, with little room for negotiation. This is true at both the bottom and top of the food chain. The only place where it isn't is the middle, where the government and union jobs lie. Lower-wage workers have to work overtime just to feed their families, and professionals have to work overtime if they don't want to kill their future career prospects.
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