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That seems so completely misguided. Why is it the government's responsibility to fix your vacation for you? Isn't it just a matter of earning enough money to af

That seems so completely misguided. Why is it the government's responsibility to fix your vacation for you? Isn't it just a matter of earning enough money to afford a vacation? I doubt rich people worry as much about little vacation time - they buy those expensive yachts and then have only two weeks per year to ride them? And even supposing there simply aren't enough jobs for everyone, and if you go on vacation somebody uses the opportunity to snatch away your job: isn't that rather a problem of distribution and work organization, not of social welfare? If it's more efficient for organizations to have one person work 40 hours than two persons 20 hours, they'll prefer that.

edem 12y ago
In Hungary (which is considered a shitty place to live) I get 23 days of paid vacation (with weekends considered it can be more than a month). I also don't have to work overtime.
shawabawa3 12y ago
> Why is it the government's responsibility to fix your vacation for you? Because life is better that way. The employer/employee relationship is incredibly biased. A lot of people simply cannot afford to lose their job, whereas pretty much every employer can afford to fire almost any individual. This means people are willing to work for little pay, poor benefits and no vacation because they are effectively forced to, even though everyone would be better off if everyone was forced to take vacation
- facepalm 12y ago
  Isn't it also the responsibility of the individual to gain skills that are valuable? I don't think what you describe is true for Software Developers in Sillicon Valley, for example. How much vacation do Software Developers in the Valley usually get?
  - kefka 12y ago
    The Silicon Valley is not indicative of jobs in the US. What some developer there gets has little/no bearing on what happens elsewhere. You also did not argue the core assertion that the employer-employee contract is heavily skewed to the employer. That has been true for the last 30 years. Productivity has made great inroads, yet pay and benefits have dropped significantly. So yes, this is a government issue. The employers have a sweet deal and the plebes have no power. But alas, Republicans in the Senate will make sure that much needed reforms won't happen.
    - facepalm 12y ago
      If employers have such a sweet deal, just become an employer? Why is there an entitlement for employment?
      - normloman 12y ago
        Because most new businesses fail. So the people best suited to start ones are people with a safety net: a lot of cash saved up, or a well off family to support them. In short, the people who can't afford to lose their jobs also cannot afford to fail in business.
        facepalm 12y ago
        Then perhaps it would make more sense to change that than to change rules about vacations. Isn't it the job of the banking system to enable people to start businesses?
        normloman 12y ago
        Have you tried getting a loan from the bank to start a business? Fat chance. And if your business fails, you still gotta pay the bank back its loan (which doesn't solve the problem in the original post. The underprivileged still can't afford to fail).
    - facepalm 12y ago
      Still, how much vacation time do Sillicon Valley developers get? If they also only get two weeks, it would invalidate the theory that people get no vacation because they are so much under pressure to not lose their jobs.
  - mgkimsal 12y ago
    not everyone can be a software developer, and frankly we can't have a society of people who only have specialist skills. There will always be a need for people with minimal skills to do low-skill jobs. They're doing work that has to get done too.
    - draugadrotten 12y ago
      > frankly we can't have a society of people who only have specialist skills. Out of curiosity, why not? And frankly, isn't it already the case? Most people are unable to produce enough for their own survival today. They can't grow crops, build a home, even make their own bread. Instead they are specialists at project management, javascript or flipping burgers. I'm not arguing that this is bad or wrong, I am only saying your statement that a society of people with specialist skills would not be possible.
      - VLM 12y ago
        For my first 10 yrs out of school there was no job market for network operators specializing in BGP. Then I did that for a bit less than a decade. Then due to consolidation and mergers there's no work in that field anymore (other than the stereotypical "move to SV/NYC"). Another direction to go is my grandma did meaningless low skill BS work in an office shuffling papers as a clerk because she specialized in knitting and had amazing knitting skills, but didn't feel like being sentenced to life in a textile sweatshop in Vietnam, or where-ever clothes were being made at that time (Vietnam now, but in the 70s? Surely not the USA by then?). For my own example there's no way I'd tolerate 140 hour work weeks as a medical doctor although I'd probably have made a heck of a doctor, and I'm not living in poverty so forget academics/sciences, and I'm not living urban and working in an open plan office so forget SV. As a hobby I enjoy woodworking but as a profession the pay is bad and the working conditions are awful, also its not very deep so I'd get bored with it long before I retire, so ... no. So you have chronological problems or retraining problems, and also people that are a skills match but hate the working environment. Maybe in a communist society the central committee could force my grandma to be a textile worker or force me to be a medical doctor or work at a startup, but there would be a lot of force involved.
      - 12y ago
- orangecat 12y ago
  The imbalance in negotiating positions is a valid point, but a basic income would solve that better than forcibly limiting everyone's productivity.
Dewie 12y ago
> Why is it the government's responsibility to fix your vacation for you? Yeah, I guess something like unions could work for that. Oh wait, apparently those are bad, too. Well I guess "just earn enough money" is the best fallback.
- icebraining 12y ago
  Yeah, I guess something like unions could work for that. Oh wait, apparently those are bad, too. Be careful about stereotyping; not everyone who dislikes the involvement of the State is against unions - as long as they're not enforced by law, but voluntary. An extreme example would be an anarcho-syndicalist, but there are libertarians who support unions as well.

edem 12y ago

In Hungary (which is considered a shitty place to live) I get 23 days of paid vacation (with weekends considered it can be more than a month). I also don't have to work overtime.

shawabawa3 12y ago

> Why is it the government's responsibility to fix your vacation for you? Because life is better that way. The employer/employee relationship is incredibly biased. A lot of people simply cannot afford to lose their job, whereas pretty much every employer can afford to fire almost any individual. This means people are willing to work for little pay, poor benefits and no vacation because they are effectively forced to, even though everyone would be better off if everyone was forced to take vacation

facepalm 12y ago
Isn't it also the responsibility of the individual to gain skills that are valuable? I don't think what you describe is true for Software Developers in Sillicon Valley, for example. How much vacation do Software Developers in the Valley usually get?
- kefka 12y ago
  The Silicon Valley is not indicative of jobs in the US. What some developer there gets has little/no bearing on what happens elsewhere. You also did not argue the core assertion that the employer-employee contract is heavily skewed to the employer. That has been true for the last 30 years. Productivity has made great inroads, yet pay and benefits have dropped significantly. So yes, this is a government issue. The employers have a sweet deal and the plebes have no power. But alas, Republicans in the Senate will make sure that much needed reforms won't happen.
  - facepalm 12y ago
    If employers have such a sweet deal, just become an employer? Why is there an entitlement for employment?
    - normloman 12y ago
      Because most new businesses fail. So the people best suited to start ones are people with a safety net: a lot of cash saved up, or a well off family to support them. In short, the people who can't afford to lose their jobs also cannot afford to fail in business.
      - facepalm 12y ago
        Then perhaps it would make more sense to change that than to change rules about vacations. Isn't it the job of the banking system to enable people to start businesses?
        normloman 12y ago
        Have you tried getting a loan from the bank to start a business? Fat chance. And if your business fails, you still gotta pay the bank back its loan (which doesn't solve the problem in the original post. The underprivileged still can't afford to fail).
  - facepalm 12y ago
    Still, how much vacation time do Sillicon Valley developers get? If they also only get two weeks, it would invalidate the theory that people get no vacation because they are so much under pressure to not lose their jobs.
- mgkimsal 12y ago
  not everyone can be a software developer, and frankly we can't have a society of people who only have specialist skills. There will always be a need for people with minimal skills to do low-skill jobs. They're doing work that has to get done too.
  - draugadrotten 12y ago
    > frankly we can't have a society of people who only have specialist skills. Out of curiosity, why not? And frankly, isn't it already the case? Most people are unable to produce enough for their own survival today. They can't grow crops, build a home, even make their own bread. Instead they are specialists at project management, javascript or flipping burgers. I'm not arguing that this is bad or wrong, I am only saying your statement that a society of people with specialist skills would not be possible.
    - VLM 12y ago
      For my first 10 yrs out of school there was no job market for network operators specializing in BGP. Then I did that for a bit less than a decade. Then due to consolidation and mergers there's no work in that field anymore (other than the stereotypical "move to SV/NYC"). Another direction to go is my grandma did meaningless low skill BS work in an office shuffling papers as a clerk because she specialized in knitting and had amazing knitting skills, but didn't feel like being sentenced to life in a textile sweatshop in Vietnam, or where-ever clothes were being made at that time (Vietnam now, but in the 70s? Surely not the USA by then?). For my own example there's no way I'd tolerate 140 hour work weeks as a medical doctor although I'd probably have made a heck of a doctor, and I'm not living in poverty so forget academics/sciences, and I'm not living urban and working in an open plan office so forget SV. As a hobby I enjoy woodworking but as a profession the pay is bad and the working conditions are awful, also its not very deep so I'd get bored with it long before I retire, so ... no. So you have chronological problems or retraining problems, and also people that are a skills match but hate the working environment. Maybe in a communist society the central committee could force my grandma to be a textile worker or force me to be a medical doctor or work at a startup, but there would be a lot of force involved.
    - 12y ago
orangecat 12y ago
The imbalance in negotiating positions is a valid point, but a basic income would solve that better than forcibly limiting everyone's productivity.

Dewie 12y ago

> Why is it the government's responsibility to fix your vacation for you? Yeah, I guess something like unions could work for that. Oh wait, apparently those are bad, too. Well I guess "just earn enough money" is the best fallback.

icebraining 12y ago
Yeah, I guess something like unions could work for that. Oh wait, apparently those are bad, too. Be careful about stereotyping; not everyone who dislikes the involvement of the State is against unions - as long as they're not enforced by law, but voluntary. An extreme example would be an anarcho-syndicalist, but there are libertarians who support unions as well.