Europeans are busy taking their vacations, but Americans are busy working, reports Fareed Zakaria, GPS. In fact, Europeans have three times more paid vacation, than their counterparts in America, and most other industrialized nations are not far behind.
To put it in perspective, according to the World Tourism Association, each worker in Italy has 42 vacation days, 37 in France, 35 in Germany, 34 in Brazil 28 in the UK, 26 in Canada, and 25 in both Japan and Korea. Americans, on the other hand have an average of 13 days.
Even more notable, according to IPSOS, the French take 89 percent of their vacation days, Germans and Indonesians take 75 percent, while only 57 of Americans take those days off.
IPSOS points out that working harder may be counterproductive. Tired employees do not do as good a job.