As a European it makes me proud to get a direct shout out from Linus 🫶🏻 <insert picture of beach here>

  • laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    4 months ago

    I actually do have separate sick leave, but plenty of times at other jobs have had combined PTO, which basically means I’m burning my potential vacation by being sick.

    Other times, I’ve not even had sick leave at all, got fired once for taking one day off with explosive diarrhea because I couldn’t afford to see a doctor to get a note on minimum wage.

    Some companies are better. Some states have actually somewhat decent protections. Lots of others are complete garbage.

    So yeah… A lot of us are jealous of what Europeans have, but not enough so to organize and demand better of our employers and our government

    • pumpkinseedoil@sh.itjust.works
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      4 months ago

      That’s just crazy… When I’m sick I’m getting paid leave - when coming to work and they notice I’m sick they’ll send me home. This even makes sense from a 100% capitalist perspective, because it costs less to pay one person to stay at home and recover as quickly as possible than to have them spread their infection, making everyone less productive, but at the same time keeping everyone at work, greatly slowing down the recovery.

      Vacation also is known to be net positive since even just one week or just a few days off every ~2 months greatly increases productivity and prevents burnouts. It’s like weekends but more extreme. You wouldn’t want someone who probably already is stressed because they have to catch up after being sick to also lose their vacation.

      Those US-american laws don’t even make sense from the USA’s system’s 100% money focused view.

      • laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        4 months ago

        They do make some sense if you consider the US’s puritanical roots where, in essence, suffering is considered good and moral, or at least leisure and enjoyment are considered hedonistic and immortal.

        Also, that for whatever reason everything is short term thinking: is this quarter better than last quarter? If not, your business is failing. Is this quarter enough better than last quarter? Business is failing.

        From a business perspective, it makes no sense, but businesses don’t make decisions. People do. And those people frequently do not stick around to see the fallout from those decisions, they just pump up the business’ bottom line long enough for the stocks to rise, sell out, then bail out taking a generous severance before the company crashes and burns.

        And nobody is really stopping it because it’s so lucrative at the individual level that the individuals that might be able to change it are profiting from it.

        And lack of regulation is what permits it to continue.