| | Americans cannot relax, while Europeans can. Americans are workaholics, while Europeans have a more sensible approach to work. Europeans also save more money. The increased work hours for Americans show little or no increase in productivity.
And maybe, just maybe, the average American, whoever that might be, is more like that -- he or she actually likes doing work and doesn't crave idleness too much. Does this have to do with some malady like workaholism? I seriously doubt it. A great deal of it nowadays comes from maxing-out-the-credit-card-ism. When I tell people that I have a savings, they are shocked. One of my good friends lost her $80,000-per-year job a few years ago, but hardly had any money when she did. This was in spite of the fact that she was single. Where does all this money go?
If they did indeed manage to find a line or work or career that is self-satisfying, that fulfills their hopes for matching their preferences and talents, why would they be looking for work that gives them so much time off? Some of them may have other interests. Heinlein made the observation that "specialization is for insects." I have often said to people that I have the "Bo Jackson Syndrome."
Some would say, well the only reason American workers do not, on average, have a good deal of vacation time is that labor unions in America are relatively weak and aren't able to bargain forcefully enough to give their members the benefits they would really like. Unions have done little or nothing for workers in the past 50 years.
Perhaps most American workers do not see the employer-employee relationship along adversarial dimensions but see it as more of a win-win situation instead of a zero-sum game. Have you ever worked for a dishonest or corrupt employer in the real world?
It may even be that those being hired by others regard themselves as joining a company instead of being conscripted by some alien force. Actually, many people simply settle. They settle because they have bills to pay. I have been working contracts for two years myself. It has paid the bills adequately, but I'm extremely dissatisfied. I have been settling in this industry for basically seven years now.
Here's a little story I heard. It's second-hand, but still quite believable. A pilot was a captain with Braniff, UPS, and Continental. Then he took a co-pilot's job to get on Southwest.
What made him take a demotion to work for Southwest? Could it be that Southwest has built a reputation for being an honest and fair company in its 35 years of existence in one of the most crooked industries in America? Could it be because Southwest has been profittable every since 1973? Could it be that Southwest sincerely cares about its employees and has never had any layoffs?
One thing I have learned is that every employer gets what he, she, or they deserve. Southwest has been reaping the rewards of that good will for many years and will continue to do so.
The normal circumstances of business, meaning those not contaminated by a bunch of Marxian ideology, may well be cooperation and friendly competition, not acrimony and hostility. Just consider that in athletics there is a good deal of competition that's vigorous as well as civilized, friendly even. That's news to me. Many businessmen are corporate-welfare statists. Braniff was constantly using political pull to try screw over Southwest in the 1970's. American still is. Just look at how several airlines were working to keep Virgin America from being launched here in the USA. Braniff and Continental kept Southwest in the courts for almost four years before they took off.
Richard Branson wrote in his book Losing My Virginity that British Airways used to call up Virgin Atlantic's customers and tell them that their flights had been cancelled. He sued them at least once. Other people warned him that he would be suing them.
Indeed, if the socialist notion that people who hire us must want to exploit us, take unfair advantage of us, hadn't gained prominence over the last two hundred years For some of us, this notion is based on real-life experience.
As with all generalizations about human affairs, there are many exceptions here but, all in all, it seems more reasonable to see the working habits of most Americans as characterized by a kind of love of their work, thus their vacation habits shaped by this rather than some kind of conspiracy theory. How much time have you spent actually talking to people in the real world? I'm in information technology and know many people who are extremely dissatisfied. Many people have already left the industry and found an industry with less drama. I know very few people who love their work.
By the way, academia is NOT the real world.
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