Here in The Netherlands we have an infinite number of sick days. You can be sick for up to a year, after that the government takes over. You take a 30% cut, but at least you have an income.
Here it's at least 24-25 days off, plus holidays (6, easter, ascension, pentecost, 2 days Christmas and January 1st). Sick leave doesn't count as off days. When you get sick during your time off and you consult a doctor those days don't count, too.
Mind you that The Netherlands, although liberal compared to the US, ranks amongst the lowest number of paid time off in Western Europe. I'm not complaining though, 25 days is a sweet spot for me: 3 weeks summer holiday, 1 week in the winter (goodbye dreary, cold days, hello sunshine!) and some days for personal stuff. I work part-time (4 days a week), so I get 20 days of paid vacation instead of 25, but for every week I take off they subtract only 4 days.
The combination of a decent amount of paid time off and the abiliy to work part-time makes for a much, much healthier work-life balance. I really hope this is something you guys across the pond will take over someday.
Edit for clarification: I realize i make it sound like we have some kind of socialist paradise here. There's another side to this: a heavy tax burden. With all the income tax, property tax, VAT (21%) and ridiculous gas prices (about $6.60 per gallon) life isn't exactly cheap here.
> There's another side to this: a heavy tax burden. With all the income tax, property tax, VAT (21%) and ridiculous gas prices (about $6.60 per gallon) life isn't exactly cheap here.
Life seems cheap in the US - until you realize you need to save like crazy: for sending kids to college, for retirement, etc. After you factor all that stuff in, it's much less rosy than it seems at first sight.
> There's another side to this: a heavy tax burden. With all the income tax, property tax, VAT (21%) and ridiculous gas prices (about $6.60 per gallon) life isn't exactly cheap here.
Any comparison with the US reminds me just how much value I'm getting in exchange for my tax. I pay it gladly. We still have a functional middle class.
With all the income tax, property tax, VAT (21%) and ridiculous gas prices (about $6.60 per gallon) life isn't exactly cheap here.
Our middle class has been demolished by the Satanic trinity: housing, healthcare, and education costs.
Tuition: our reputable public universities are comparable to European private ones in cost. Our private ones cost almost $50k per year. It's also competitive enough to get into the top universities that the game increasingly starts in high school or before; in New York, it's very typical for merely middle-class parents to hawk up $30k per kid per year from ages 4 to 18: admissions are that competitive.
Health insurance is another nightmare. Decent plans cost $500 per month for an individual in a employer-provided plan (and, increasingly, "employee contribution" of 25-100% is the norm). If you're on the individual market, you're fucked: it's closer to $1500 per month if you're healthy and have no children.
Then there is housing. You can actually get a good deal (say, $150 per ft^2) in wide swathes of the country-- but those are in places with imploded job markets. To buy anywhere with an active job market is pretty much unaffordable on the typical software engineer salary, and even rents will typically be 20 to 40% of after-tax income.
Europe has a lot of issues and extended liabilities, but the U.S. is far more fucked in the coming decade. I'd gladly pay $7/gallon for gas not to have to worry about healthcare (even if you have insurance, it will often fail you at the worst time) or, in the future should I have kids, education costs.
> I'd gladly pay $7/gallon for gas not to have to worry about healthcare (even if you have insurance, it will often fail you at the worst time) or, in the future should I have kids, education costs.
I wonder if there are arbitrage opportunities for the education of the children. You live in the US but you have your kids study in Europe - French universities for example are free, so if the kids can speak French it will be cheaper to have them study there, and as Americans their chances of admissions must be pretty high.
Except that French universities are crap, because they aren't allowed to select and have tiny budgets (due to being free). So the real education happens at the Grande Ecoles, which are either very hard to get into (STEM) or very expensive (Business). And in fact a lot of French parents are willing to pay for a UK or US education (usually if the kids are good but not quite good enough to go to an elite French college)
Here it's at least 24-25 days off, plus holidays (6, easter, ascension, pentecost, 2 days Christmas and January 1st). Sick leave doesn't count as off days. When you get sick during your time off and you consult a doctor those days don't count, too.
Mind you that The Netherlands, although liberal compared to the US, ranks amongst the lowest number of paid time off in Western Europe. I'm not complaining though, 25 days is a sweet spot for me: 3 weeks summer holiday, 1 week in the winter (goodbye dreary, cold days, hello sunshine!) and some days for personal stuff. I work part-time (4 days a week), so I get 20 days of paid vacation instead of 25, but for every week I take off they subtract only 4 days.
The combination of a decent amount of paid time off and the abiliy to work part-time makes for a much, much healthier work-life balance. I really hope this is something you guys across the pond will take over someday.
Edit for clarification: I realize i make it sound like we have some kind of socialist paradise here. There's another side to this: a heavy tax burden. With all the income tax, property tax, VAT (21%) and ridiculous gas prices (about $6.60 per gallon) life isn't exactly cheap here.