All-American Vacations

I posted an earlier version of this at Article 19 a few weeks ago, but since the Prez is off on a five-week “working” vacation in Texas, it somehow seemed time to revisit the subject.

It’s no secret that vacation habits differ on opposing sides of the Atlantic. I imagine that readers of this blog hew close to the good old, All-American Protestant work ethic and don’t take much time off from work (for extra points, how many of you feel guilty when you do take vacation?). On the other hand, W unashamedly follows the French on the issue, taking huge swaths of leisure time. Other presidents might have stayed closer to Washington during a time of war, but not this one--he knows where he puts his priorities. Earlier this year, the Harvard Institute of Economic Research issued a paper entitled, "Work and Leisure in the U.S. and Europe: Why so Different?" (abstract here), which started some blog chatter. The main thrust of the paper, which I first encountered in a post by Matthew Yglesias, is that Europeans have traded lower annual salaries for several more weeks of vacation. Kevin Drum jumped in, which prompted this response from an American living in Germany and enjoying his leisure. On his way out of town to start his own five-week vacation, Pascal Riche, Washington bureau chief for Libération, also weighed in. He pointed out that Americans work more hours each year than people in most other industrialized countries: two months more than the Europeans. (He also claimed that we work two or three weeks more than the stereotypically workaholic Japanese, but from the stats I could find, it appears that we're about the same). He also mentions (citing this graph) that working Americans toil for 20 percent longer than we did in 1970, while the French, Germans, and Japanese work 23.5, 17.1, and 16.6 percent less, respectively.

So how do we feel about all work and not-so-much play (we've seen The Shining; we know what that can lead to)? Who'd give up some of our consumerism for a little more leisure time?