Report: U.S. workers squandering 705 million vacation days per year
Employees are taking more time off—and employers are encouraging them to do so—but many in the workforce are still giving away nearly $600 worth of work time annually.
Time off is meant to be a blissful, blessed respite from job-related stress, anxiety and annoyance.
More than half of U.S. workers, however, still can’t seem to tear themselves away from their jobs. According to Project: Time Off’s 2018 State of American Vacation report, 52 percent of American employees left some vacation time unused in 2017, even though “the data shows an unmistakably strong correlation between travel and happiness.”
Overall, the U.S. workforce neglected to cash in about 705 million vacation days last year, but there’s been a slow uptick of taking more time off for three years in a row. In 2014—the “lowest point of America’s vacation use”—workers took an average of just 16 days off per year. Project: Time Off’s 2018 report claims that number is now 17.2 days per employee.
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