this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2025
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Over here in Germany where everybody has at least 3 weeks paid time off (being ill does not count to this contingent btw), it is common that leaves are planned in the beginning of the year for larger vacations, so there are no collisions.
Also, if you have children you have priority during school breaks for paied leaves.
This concept could be copied by us employers also, I wonder why not? Maybe because this way you can pressure your employees with your vacation as leverage
And in this system, it is common courtesy to make effort to make sure your team has as few problems as possible from your absence. Of course it is also common courtesy that you are not contact for anything work related during your vacation time.
All of this is possible in North America, but you need a union job.
My day-job is a unionionized Managed Services gig subsidiary of a larger company. The rest of the company fits a stereotype we see in the deLoittes and IBM Pro Servs of the world, but the union contract gives us a sane bit of breathing room:
The combo of compressed time, stats and careful placement of my 21 vacation days this year will give me 7 carefully-placed weeks off; it's not contiguous, but it's really great.
Can you explain 9x9 to me? That's confusing. 24x7, 8x5 yeah. But you can't mean that notation? Or did the US finally change to a 10 day week?
9 working hours, 9 days. you hit 80 hours in nine days, so the tenth day you get off. basically an extra day off every other week
Oh, ok. Well, we have 40 hour weeks per law, and a maximum working time of 10hours per day, so we can do the same l, and my employer is fine with it.
Thanks!
This is exactly what seems to be missing in the US: courtesy.
A system that gives everyone entitled leave means better employees and less downtime due to leave (surprise surprise, courtesy leads to coordination).
Shockingly this leads to people caring about their team mates, and things aren't zero sum anymore.
In the Netherlands we have laws in place to ensure what is called "good employership" and "good employeeship". It's basically the minimum of what you should expect from each other in matters of courtesy. Good employership as a minimum states an employer should be thoroughly, not abuse his powers as an employer, substantiate big decisions regarding employees, live up to expectations, treat all employees equal and provide good insurance.
Good employeeship is seen as being at work at agreed upon times (this includes taking PTO), doing suitable work, being honest, loyalty to a certain degree like not starting a company without consultation and "stealing" work from the employer, and descretion/secrecy regarding company sensitive information.
It's all very general, and most of the time further explained either in additional laws or in a "CAO", a collective working conditions agreement which is reviewed periodically with the unions (about 70-75% of employees have such an agreement).
if my compensation includes paid time off, I am taking it. my notifications are not requests when the date is weeks or months out. it is informational only.
i do not and never have accepted blackout day etc.
i’m honest with this during the hiring process and it’s, honestly, worked out just fine. especially if you frame it as a part of forward thinking communication and the manager is trying to pretend they know what they are doing.
If communicated and part of the deal, great. I personally think that an employment benefits both parties. And with the mentioned curtisyz that works well.
For example, I leave early for appointments, in the last weeks we had some troubles, so dinner for the hole family was on the employer, a while week of takeouts.
So, if my employer tells me that my vacation colides with a project, I am certain that he checked every possibility, and we try to find solutions, like interruptijg the vacation for a day and taking part in meetings from my hotel room.
And if I can not trust my employer enough, then I move on. I am in the lucky position that the stuff I do, most people can't.
But it's also known that for example august is a slow month so you are not expecting a full workforce.
Yeah but courtesy is running dry as of late :(
My previous employer in the US was pretty liberal with their time off policy. I would just submit a request, and my manager would approve or not approve. 100% of the time when they didn't approve, it was because the email had gotten lost in their in box, so I just pestered them about it. It was assumed that employees would check with project managers of projects they were on to make sure their vacations wouldn't cause problems for the projects - which basically just meant that I would tell my PMs that I was planning to take X days off about a month from now, and they would say "thanks for letting me know, I'll work that into the project schedule!"
That is how I expect it at every company! Great!
it is with ‘skilled’ labor
sadly this pool keeps getting smaller and smaller
I don't see why this pool should logically get smaller. In the other hand though, the USA avoids the way, other countries are handling job training , like the devil water.
No, skilled labor gets more important from day to day. But it costs more. So let's hire people that will settle for less, and kick them out if they reach there limit.
In most countries, you have a multi year on the job training + school before you consideres a skilled worker in this job. I for example carry the title of a "Journeyman of Electronics and Communication". I am not working in this field anymore, but usually, most people stay with that they learned.
Long ramble short: no the pool of skilled jobs is shrinking, capitalism is expanding
mostly because that skilled labor pool has been primarily in tech the last 2 decades in the US and tech bro billionaires are currently doing their best to fuck all these workers over for profits
sadly much of the industry will fallow the FAANG corps lead with pay/benefits
oh in america management requests you plan them early then ignores reality anyway.
This surprises me actually, it seems to have a built-in discrimination from the outset.
I've got little PhobosAnomalies at home, and my jobs over the years have taken me all over the place so school holidays haven't been a priority for me. That said, I wouldn't personally consider my need to have a week or two off in the school holidays or summer holidays as a priority, more just the same importance of everyone else. After all, having little'uns is mostly a choice (or sometimes, the choice isn't even available 😢) so it seems like a world of employment law hurt to grant the parents a higher level of priority than others.
That said, I ain't in Germany so it's a moot point really.
It's not actually a rule or law, just what people are usually doing anyway.
If people have the choice to take their holiday on a school break or not, then most take it not on school breaks. Everywhere you go at that time is packed with people.
But taking it during a school break when you don't need to, when at the same time your colleague can only take it during that time if they want to spend time with their family - well then it is just basic human decency to let them have that timeslot.
Ah, thanks for the clarification.
I understand though, you make great points. There's a big rumble of discontent in the UK at the moment as resorts proper take the piss during the school holidays, just to take advantage of families wanting to head off somewhere in the alotted times. There's more than a handful of folk who just pull their kids out of school during term time - whether it's a good or bad idea comes down to subjective opinion, but saving four figures on going a week or two earlier is quite a convincing argument!
Back on topic: I'm just looking at it from an angle different to my own is all, I'd be pretty pissed off that I'd have my leave request deprioritised for the sole reason that I hadn't rawdogged a girl more than four years and nine months prior!
Everywhere i have worked so far (office work) the holiday planning was made just by communicating with your colleagues. You just find a compromise that works for everybody. (Although there is a mentality of "first come, first serve". If you really need a holiday at a specific time, then better state it early, so the others can plan around it.) The official holiday request afterwards is just a formality, because everything is already planned through and the boss has no reason to decline it.
I am sure there are workplaces where it is handled differently, but that is my personal experience as an office worker.
I was so lucky in the past. Now I am working directly under higher management. Dude, things change up here .... First of all: no team. Only multiple managers with projects, timelines and the need of me for those projects.
But, as mentioned, the common base stays the same.
I'll stay far away from management. :)
In my 24 years in the workforce, I ran into such a situation once. And I moved my vacation 3 days and everything was fine. It is not very common. I just mentioned it because I think that it illustrates some back thought on the whole concept very well: employee and their families are important.
Another thing: legally an employer can only deny vacations if your absence would mean major damage for the company.
And if already approved absences are canceled, the company have to compensate you for flights and other bookings. In full
Awesome. Thanks for helping me see your viewpoint - it's likely a very minor difference in cultural expectations. It's super cool to see how our bros (other siblings descriptors are available) from the continent work around things.
I've worked for a number of organisations in my time too, and one common theme - very much like yours - is that protections against pre-booked time off are pretty strong. Whether it's being paid double-time; having three times your cancelled leave days refunded for each day you were recalled; or generally just giving you a bonus payment - it's gotta be pretty fuckin' wild for someone to be instructed back to work from pre-booked leave.
As you have alluded to though, communication is key 😊
Yes, no. We have strict school attendece laws (and no homeschooling btw), so you can't just do some vacation sometimes else this year.
Also, the kids have a right to free time and vacation.
And: traveling outside school breaks is far more convenient anyways.. no kids at the pool
It’s just left up to the employers. My employer gives me 4 weeks paid vacation, with sick time being additional to that and they have never given me a hard time for taking time off, even with just a few days notice.
We have a mixture. We have laws mandate minimum to vacation time, that the employer must respect the preferred dates for the free time as stated by its employees and only may deny or cancel vacation if the company would take major damage. And major as in: we have to let people go or even close major.
If the employer cancels your vacation, he must compensate you in full for all financial losses due to bookings for example.
In addition, paid time off and working hours are if course also benefits that could be used to attract employees
30 days vacation/ year , to 38 hour week, working from wherever I want, even in some pool in some hotel, and of course, paid sick leave. That is my current luxury.
And don't forget: about 10 work free holidays per year ;)