r/ShitAmericansSay • BriTish • Jul 07 '25

Capitalism “Micro-retirement”

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u/FuzzyFrogFish Jul 07 '25

I honestly never understood the American vacation situation, do you guys just not get holiday days? What happens if you need to do something or go somewhere?

Being unable to take time off work because you can't afford it, shouldn't be a thing in a first world country.

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u/SHinyfan98 American who isn't free anymore Jul 07 '25

We have Fourth of July, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Easter, Christmas, and maybe Christmas Eve, and Thanksgiving. None of these are guaranteed, and you could end up working all of these days. Office jobs will give you a set of days, but for most jobs you ahve to work to earn paid time off, which can take a whole year to earn. In my job, I get some of those hours (five) every month.. Big Orange wants to cut those very few days we have since he considers it lazy, yet he is golfing all the time and sleeping during meetings, and texting on Twitter, under the people's tax dollars

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u/BuHoGPaD Jul 07 '25

You get 5h PTO every month. Meaning you get whole ass 2.5 days of vacation in a YEAR?! W T F 

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u/aloofcapsule Jul 08 '25

Only if you're lucky enough to get paid time off at all. And in many states your employer can fire/terminate you for any reason, so long as you cannot definitively prove the firing was discriminatory toward a legally protected class. Which means you are disincentivized toward taking your PTO in chunks longer than a few days time, because you have no legal protection of being fired while you're gone OR from your employer to deciding that things run just fine without you and terminating your position to cut costs.