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Comment by benwerd | Hacker News Reader

I really like this. They're an English company, of course, and must adhere to the European legal minimum of 28 days a year. I've never understood the American attitude towards vacation - unnecessarily macho, and geared towards burning people out (and, at the two-weeks-a-year end of the spectrum, effectively forcing people to never leave the country).

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Depends on the company. In my home country in Austria I've got 25 paid days off + public holidays per year. Here in the US I get 15 paid days off (+ public holidays). While it's lot less it is not that bad.

Three weeks seems pretty unacceptable to me. I would be alright with four weeks and happy about five.

Agreed. I work for a UK University and get 30 days paid leave, plus public holidays, plus Christmas to New Year on top of that. Means I can take a couple of long holidays a year and still have plenty of long weekends and the odd day off here and there.

Even the staff on the lower "grades" get all of the above except for 25 instead of 30 days.

Just take the holidays between the jobs. :) I took 4 months off between my last job and my current job, even though I would have had the chance to start immediately.

In addition, some companies here also allow you to take unpaid holidays if justified. Even with an additional of two weeks of unpaid holidays I would earn more money here in the US than in Austria (and the available jobs are much more interesting).

I guess that’s an alternative but what if I don’t want to switch jobs all that often?

I personally need regular breaks. Irregular and really long breaks do less for me than regular breaks.

Just take the holidays between the jobs.

That might work for the kind of jobs HN posters work at, but the people who are most likely to have little or no vacation are probably also the ones that can't actually afford to be without a job even for a week (if they can find a new one).

Like so many other policies in the US, it works pretty well for the well-off, but keeps the working class toiling.

Same in IL - came from DE with 28 days, now I'm down to 18 and that's considered generous..

I believe the EU Working Time Directive only mandates 20 days holidays per year. Many countries give additional fixed public holidays off.

Minimum 28 days, is that including public holidays?

As in Sweden, 25 days is minimum paid vacation, not including public holidays.

The 28 day minimum includes public holidays (UK).

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Employment/Employees/Timeoffandh...

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