AFP – In Western culture, mid-year is the time when people traditionally take several weeks off work. Even the pace in the office seems to slow down (at least in many professions).
But this is far from being the case everywhere.
In the United States (US), for example, workers enjoy 10 public holidays a year, but there is no federal law obliging companies to grant paid days off to their employees. In other words, this “privilege” depends on the goodwill of individual companies.
“The average employee gets 14 days after their first year with a company, but 15 per cent of civilian workers get no paid leave at all, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD),” explained research by the Dutch CV creation tool, Resume.io.
The US is not the only country not to grant statutory paid leave to employees: Micronesia, Nauru and Kiribati, all located in Oceania, are also on the list.
Micronesia, in addition to not granting paid vacations, does not grant any public holidays at all, making it “the worst country” in the world for paid vacation days, according to the research, which covers every country in the world.
Other countries offering very few paid vacations each year include Tanzania (three days), the Philippines and China (five), and Mexico, Thailand and Nigeria (six).
Conversely, Europe clearly stands out as the continent where countries are the most generous, offering a minimum of 20 days of paid leave per year. France (25 working days per year) stands out in particular.
But the world record stands at 30 days a year, enjoyed by workers in countries including Monaco, Andorra, Algeria, Yemen and Bhutan. In all, the study identified just over 20 countries with a 30-day annual leave count. The average by country is 18.2 days of paid vacation per year.
