Here in Japan, people I’ve talked to will say that decades ago around New Years, everything was closed for days. No super markets. No restaurants. Not even ATMs

Here in Japan, people I’ve talked to will say that decades ago around New Years, everything was closed for days. No super markets. No restaurants. Not even ATMs. The downside is it requires a lot of prep work pre-holiday (i.e. packing sandwiches instead of fast food). I think we can do without a lot more than what we think, but the burden is shifted to the consumer instead of the worker, so without a strong culture of shared holidays you’ll see more and more people at work.