
Study Finds That Asians Take Fewest Vacation Days, Europeans Take Most - rtcoms
http://www.forbes.com/sites/grantmartin/2015/11/17/study-finds-that-asians-take-fewest-vacation-days-europeans-take-most/
======
patio11
_Japanese workers are offered an average of twenty days off each year and take
only twelve, leaving eight unused vacation days lying on the table._

No lie, that's a qualified success: it used to be 14 days offered and 8
exercised in Japan, as recently as a few years ago. (The 2006ish timeframe?
Read it in a work-related report. [+])

[+] Proving once again that you can almost never underestimate how bad the
Japanese work culture is, the actual stats from 平成19年就労条件総合調査結果の概況 (covering
2006) were, at companies above 1,000 employees, 9.7 days offered and 5
actually used. You might think "Well maybe that's the megacorps being shoddy"
but the actual numbers get _worse_ as you go down the size-of-employer table.

~~~
artifaxx
That's just scary. It definitely shows how much culture can change/warp our
ideas about existence. Although that few days off probably is a significant
factor in heightened Japanese suicide rates.

~~~
bane
Mind blowing (but not surprising) is how low Japan (and South Korea) ranks in
terms of worker productivity. IIR, if South Koreans worked at a similar
productivity as Norwegians, they could take half the week off with no effects
at all on GDP. Japan is only slightly better.

In other words, quite a bit of those long work hours are absolutely useless.

~~~
rahimnathwani
This is overly-simplistic, and misses three key points:

1) Labour productivity is measured as the _average_ output per worker, i.e.
total output divided by total number of workers. It does not measure the
_marginal_ output of an additional worker (i.e. the derivative of output with
respect to number of workers).

2) Labour is not the only factor of production. There is also land, financial
capital, technology, etc.

3) Haircuts in Norway cost more than haircuts in South Korea. Is a South
Korean barber less productive than a Norwegian one?

~~~
nightcracker
So if I understand correctly we should compare:

1\. Median household income (which should mostly be wages and not land,
financial capital, technology).

2\. Divided by purchasing power parity (to normalize for different prices in
the country).

3\. Divided by average hours worked per week for households with median
income.

This is however assuming that if an employee gets paid X (in purchasing power
parity) for their work, then their generated value is some linear constant of
X. I don't know how to compensate for the scenario where this is false.

~~~
hueving
None of that would account for a massive national surplus of a globally
demanded resource (oil in Norway's case). A strong currency based on heavy
exports of energy can subsidize all of the other factors.

~~~
martin_bech
Norways Currency NOK isnt strong, its actually one of the weaker currencies:

Here it is in the last 2 years falling compared to USD and EUR.

[http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=NOK&to=USD&view=2Y](http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=NOK&to=USD&view=2Y)
[http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=NOK&to=EUR&view=2Y](http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=NOK&to=EUR&view=2Y)

~~~
dennisgorelik
Norway is oil exporter. Oil is cheap now -> NOK is falling.

------
CognitiveLens
It's so strange when otherwise-rigorous research/reporting makes
generalizations about "Asians", which is an incredibly diverse continent that
is not defined by Japan, China, and South Korea.

It's okay to be more specific - the data and conclusions would still be
interesting even if they weren't trying to claim some magical cultural link
among Saudi Arabia, Russia, Mongola, Singaport, Bangladesh, etc...

~~~
dba7dba
I agree that 'Asia' includes very very different cultures. Asia really should
really be divided into smaller chunks.

~~~
fla
As do Europe. Many different culutres and politics.

France pretend to cap work at 35h/week, next to it is Switzerland where we
have 20 days of vacation and 42h/week.

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johnkpush
I worked for a Swedish company. Because of holidays, vacation leave, maternity
and paternity leave, and sick days, there were employees of the company that I
never saw. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but it took quite a while to get
used to it.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
I like the ambiguity in your comment that leaves open the possibility that it
was you that never turned up for work due to these various ways if taking time
off.

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zerocrat
I found it interesting how Expedia is behind this study. I can see how this
would help their bottom line.

For those interested, source data for the study.

[https://images.trvl-
media.com/media/content/expus/graphics/o...](https://images.trvl-
media.com/media/content/expus/graphics/other/pdf/Expedia-
VacationDeprivation2012.pdf)

------
csantini
Not working at all is the inevitable (awesome) future of humanity.

~~~
andrewbalitsky
I would dispute the awesomeness of no work at all. We're not well equipped for
total leisure. To paraphrase Tal Ben-Shahar, "we're built for the climb, not
the summit" ( check the book "Flow" or google "Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi" for a
scientific explanation as to exactly why )

~~~
eCa
But climbs you don't get payed for can be just as (or more)
rewarding/challenging.

~~~
andrewbalitsky
Of course. So I would hope that the future holds this different sort of work.
Not 'no work' at all.

------
mavdi
Not only that, in Asia they work longer hours too. When I visited Japan, I
noticed rush hour in Tokyo would start round about 6pm and would go on until
10pm.

Compare that with London, starts around 5pm and pretty much everyone is
dispersed by 7pm.

------
dogma1138
Is there some way to normalize this with average income per employee, number
of public holidays, non-paid leave taken, actual average retirement age, and
non standard vacations like sabbaticals (Pretty much everyone I ever known to
take a sabbatical/career break for a year or so was from the US)? Because this
would be actually quit interesting to check, otherwise it's just quite random
correlation.

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Oletros
In Spain, the work law (Estatuto de los trabajadores) specifies a minimum of
30 natural days or 22 working days of vacation days so it is normal that you
take them.

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skimmas
And then o look at the map and think... what does this title even mean?

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johnshaft1000
Shocker. They really needed a study to determine this?

~~~
hooliu
Yes, because the alternative is racism.

~~~
Fiahil
A genuine question: is making assumptions based on perceived cultural
influence incorrect?

I mean, I know asian work cultures are "harder" than my european one, but is
it incorrect to spell that in a public/social context?

~~~
TeMPOraL
It's not incorrect (it'll just lead you to results as good as your assumptions
were), but it today's climate, it's definitely not a good idea to say it out
loud.

------
SixSigma
Good on you Turkish, Chechens and Georgians. Uncle Joe Stalin would be proud
of his fellow Asian descendants.

~~~
guard-of-terra
Not sure what you wanted to convey, but Chechens live north of Caucasus
mountains, which probably makes them Europeans. Now that's a scary idea.

~~~
prodmerc
They're about as European as the Albanians lol

~~~
oblio
The Albanians are one of the oldest population groups in Europe. They are
descended from Paleo-Balkanic peoples.

~~~
prodmerc
Well, OK, I just recently learned they're an mostly Islamic country who love
their gun culture.

An odd combination for any "European" country, yet they're technically in
Southern Europe.

Nothing against it, really, but they don't fit in with the neighbors, for
sure...

~~~
oblio
Finns and Czechs also love their guns. And Albanians used to be Christians
until they were converted under Ottoman rule.

If you take any given coordinates available in Europe, you're bound to find
oddballs.

Oh, and regarding Islam, there's Wahhabism and there's the Ottoman-style Sunni
Islam (I don't know the historic name for it). The two have little in common.
The Muslims in Europe are 99% results of Ottoman influence. So European
Muslims, especially in the Balkans, are quite moderate.

~~~
guard-of-terra
There's no reason why moderate Muslims won't gravitate towards Wahhabism. For
three reasons:

\- Wahhabism seems to be sound, certainly more than selective reading of holy
books and closing eyes on some scenes. Of course, I'm not Muslim so I can't
really judge.

\- Saudi Arabia is pouring billions of oil dollars into promoting Wahhabism
worldwide: building mosques, educating priests, etc etc.

\- There does not seem to be a productive, attractive doctrine for moderate,
tolerant Muslim. As far as I see, it's pacified on ad hoc basis.

------
simonebrunozzi
Well, they could have just asked me (I lived in Europe, Asia, currently US),
the answer would have been the same :)

------
cft
I know that correlation does not imply causation, but EU GDP growth is the
lowest in the world [1], while Asian is the highest.

1\. [https://www.gfmag.com/global-data/economic-data/economic-
dat...](https://www.gfmag.com/global-data/economic-data/economic-dataworlds-
gdp-growth-by-region)

~~~
irixusr
The EU block's GDP is also the highest in the world though, with little room
to grow.

Furthermore, the only Asian country if comparable GOP/capita is Japan which
has smaller growth than Europe for two decades...

~~~
TulliusCicero
South Korea has a similar GDP/capita to many European countries. Not the
richer ones, but some countries in Southern or Eastern Europe.

~~~
irixusr
Sure S. Korea is great Taiwan also. But before insinuating that europe's
economic woes are due to their summer holidays, I'd look at curroption and the
like.

