This just in from Allianz: Americans are stressed at work and not vacationing as much as, well, they probably deserve to. The survey found that 42% of Americans don’t take all their allotted paid vacation days—including nearly half (48%) of people aged 18 to 34, even though millennials and Gen X’ers are more likely than Baby Boomers to feel that annual vacations are important. In addition, 25% of Americans reported having negative feelings when asking for time off. And millennials (aged 18 to 34) are the most likely to feel nervous, guilty, afraid, or shameful because of a time-off request.
The findings—which are not necessarily surprising—are summed up in the short video below:
The most common reasons for negative feelings when asking for time off included, according to those polled: not wanting to disappoint immediate teams and peers or direct boss and managers, the senior management team expecting the respondents to not to take all their vacation time, and self-guilt. The results also showed that “the decreasing significance put on annual vacations” could well be a factor in the trend away from actually taking time off. A shocking 41% of Americans reported annual vacations are not very (18%) or not at all (23%) important to them, a six-point increase from 2016.
“We were surprised to see that when compared to older generations, millennials more commonly succumb to these negative feelings by choosing not to take all their entitled vacation days,” said Daniel Durazo, director of communications at Allianz Global Assistance USA. “Meanwhile, Gen X’ers place the same amount of importance on vacations, but seem to have the system better figured out because they are the most likely to take all their allotted vacation time.”
Disclaimer: Johnny Jet works as an ambassador for Allianz Global Assistance (AGA Service Company) and receives financial compensation.
For more information about Allianz Global, visit AllianzTravelInsurance.com.
