Do Americans Work Too Much?

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This is what leaving workplace hours to the market has wrought. But, for once, time is on our side. Eight economic boom years have created a nearly full-employment economy and unprecedented opportunity to address the vacation issue. Companies are scrambling to find employees. It’s a seller’s market that has created more confident, outspoken workers, who for the first time in decades are speaking up for their share of the productivity dividend that seems only to go into executives’ pockets.

And there’s one more auspicious sign. It’s a national political season. There are votes to be won, candidates to be grilled on where they stand on the quality-of-life issue of vacation time. I made a few calls to see if any of the presidential contenders was brave enough, or smart enough, to address the issue. Surprisingly, I found plenty of support—at the worker-bee level. At George W. Bush’s headquarters, for instance, an aide answered my pitch for a mandated three-week vacation with: “That sounds great. We need that here.”

None of the candidates had a position on vacation time, not surprisingly, since it had never come up before. Vice President Al Gore had no comment. (Editor’s Note: An Utne Reader staffer passed a version of this story to Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader at a campaign appearance. Nader responded, “I can get behind that.” He and his staff are now exploring the issue but had made no endorsement at the time we went to press.) Of course, even if the candidates had studied the issue, supporting more time off would initially seem a colossally stupid move—anti-business and instant fund-raising suicide.

Courage among politicians is a little like El Niño: It only shows up when heat is applied. That’s where we come in. Let’s turn up the temperature on candidates, Congress members, and local officials. Send e-mail and faxes, make phone calls, hit their Web sites, write letters to the editor.

While there’s no doubt that we’re the home of the brave—a nation ready to work till it drops—can we really be the land of the free when we’re on the chain gang 50 weeks a year? I asked Orvar Löfgren to imagine what it would be like for him in the American vacation system, no five to seven weeks off, just that long tunnel of 11 and a half months of work every year stretching to the grave. He considered the possibility: “I would think, how could I survive? I would feel claustrophobic. It’s a question of priorities. In Europe, vacations have become a basic facet of the quality of life.”

Why not here? We’ve lost sight in the overwork hysteria of what makes it all worthwhile— the time to enjoy the fruits of our labor. What’s the point of it all if there’s no time to live but only to exist? Having time for family, friends, exploring, reflecting, hiking—these are the things that give meaning to life. I don’t think at the end of our days we’re going to be looking back on that great 80-hour week we pulled back in ‘99. It’s going to be the time playing ball with a kid, snorkeling off Maui, lingering over coffee in a sidewalk café—the time when we had time, the most precious natural resource of all.

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