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> Australians manage to travel more than average despite being an island surrounded by ocean. A large fraction of that is to New Zealand and Indonesia, where t

> Australians manage to travel more than average despite being an island surrounded by ocean. A large fraction of that is to New Zealand and Indonesia, where they aren't crossing an ocean. Sydney to Bali is a roughly six hour 4,600 km flight. That distance won't get you from Boston to Dublin, which is about the shortest international flight from the US to someplace outside of North America. Los Angeles to Tokyo is almost twice as far. > a culture which thinks "two weeks paid time off, don't even think of taking them both at the same time" is an adequate amount of vacation Cultures don't think, individuals do. And almost every individual in America doesn't think that two weeks of vacation is adequate. They think having a job and being able to put food on the table is better than not being able to do that. Most Americans are victims of shitty corporate policies. It's hard to push for better working conditions when billionaires have spent millions dismantling the labor movement over the past several decades.

ghaff 4y ago
>Cultures don't think, individuals do. I was up to 3-4 weeks of vacation at a job I had pretty much the whole 90s. During that time, I took a few month-long vacations to places like Nepal. I had coworkers who basically questioned out loud "How could you do that? I could never go away for that length of time." Depends on the company and role of course. (I was subsequently with a very small company and it would have been difficult especially for non-summer months.) Never had an issue and, in fact, they pulled out all the stops when it was time for me to leave to try to get me to stay. But a lot of people assume that norms are carved in stone and they often aren't, especially if you're valued.
- gtop3 4y ago
  In software engineering you can find jobs with 3-6 weeks of vacation a year. Even 4 weeks is long enough to spend 2 weeks abroad and have a enough time left over for a few long weekends and extra time off during the holidays.
  - deprecative 4y ago
    Even in my experience that even when you have these several week long PTO positions you don't get to use them. It seems like the PM is always concerned about a timeline or a manager won't approve it unless you give a year lead time. So, I've personally just ignored PTO as part of the benefits as long as it's at least two weeks. Hopefully this isn't the same for a lot of the folks on here. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to take even a few days off only for it to be denied by a PM or EM or HR because "we're busy".
notahacker 4y ago
> Cultures don't think, individuals do. And almost every individual in America doesn't think that two weeks of vacation is adequate. They think having a job and being able to put food on the table is better than not being able to do that. Most Americans are victims of shitty corporate policies. It's hard to push for better working conditions when billionaires have spent millions dismantling the labor movement over the past several decades. The average unskilled Australian teenager doesn't have more ability to put food on the table or negotiating power than the average US software developer, but will be much, much more likely to spend the next six months travelling round Europe (closer to San Francisco than Sydney) without even having to join the Peace Corp or learn a language to prove their worthiness, or to turn down or quit a job that doesn't give them enough holiday entitlement. Corporate policies and legislative priorities are a product of culture too: it's not like Australian billionaires love their labour movements.

ghaff 4y ago

>Cultures don't think, individuals do. I was up to 3-4 weeks of vacation at a job I had pretty much the whole 90s. During that time, I took a few month-long vacations to places like Nepal. I had coworkers who basically questioned out loud "How could you do that? I could never go away for that length of time." Depends on the company and role of course. (I was subsequently with a very small company and it would have been difficult especially for non-summer months.) Never had an issue and, in fact, they pulled out all the stops when it was time for me to leave to try to get me to stay. But a lot of people assume that norms are carved in stone and they often aren't, especially if you're valued.

gtop3 4y ago
In software engineering you can find jobs with 3-6 weeks of vacation a year. Even 4 weeks is long enough to spend 2 weeks abroad and have a enough time left over for a few long weekends and extra time off during the holidays.
- deprecative 4y ago
  Even in my experience that even when you have these several week long PTO positions you don't get to use them. It seems like the PM is always concerned about a timeline or a manager won't approve it unless you give a year lead time. So, I've personally just ignored PTO as part of the benefits as long as it's at least two weeks. Hopefully this isn't the same for a lot of the folks on here. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to take even a few days off only for it to be denied by a PM or EM or HR because "we're busy".

notahacker 4y ago

> Cultures don't think, individuals do. And almost every individual in America doesn't think that two weeks of vacation is adequate. They think having a job and being able to put food on the table is better than not being able to do that. Most Americans are victims of shitty corporate policies. It's hard to push for better working conditions when billionaires have spent millions dismantling the labor movement over the past several decades. The average unskilled Australian teenager doesn't have more ability to put food on the table or negotiating power than the average US software developer, but will be much, much more likely to spend the next six months travelling round Europe (closer to San Francisco than Sydney) without even having to join the Peace Corp or learn a language to prove their worthiness, or to turn down or quit a job that doesn't give them enough holiday entitlement. Corporate policies and legislative priorities are a product of culture too: it's not like Australian billionaires love their labour movements.