How many days off do you get?

How many days off do Canadians get? Turns out, we don’t get many!

Let’s say you’re entering a new job in the private sector; you get 10 days of annual leave and you have 5 national public holidays (ahem, that don’t fall on a weekend!). Depending on your province or territory, maybe you get another holiday or two.

According to a recent study by Hotels.com, Canadians only get 15 days of paid leave. When it comes to time away from work, Canada ranks 29th among 30 other countries.

Topping the list are Russia, Italy and Sweden, where workers get between 36 and 40 paid days off per year. Even our friends south of the border get 5 more paid days off than we do!

For a look at the greener grass on the other side of the Atlantic, we turned to Heather Brooker, regional vice-president for the Outside Canada region.

Brooker, who works in Moscow, said there’s nothing unusual about the amount of paid days off Russians get, especially compared to other European countries.

“They have a heck of a lot more stat holidays than we do here in Canada,” said Brooker.

For our members working in Canadian embassies abroad, national public holidays present a different problem.

“Our stat holidays are a combination of Canadian and Russian holidays,” explained Brooker. “So we have to give up some Canadian holidays in order to embrace the Russians.”

Likewise, Russians working as local employees in the same embassy don’t get as many holidays – and they’re stuck with holidays (such as Canada Day!) that don’t have any meaning to them.

Given the lack of access to paid time off in Canada, there’s a clear advantage to being unionized. According to the Canadian Labour Congress, most unionized workers start off with three weeks of paid vacation time. Four years later, 70% will benefit from four weeks off.

And, in this day and age, that time away from work is becoming all the more precious.

“I think that many of us aren’t easily detached from our mobile tools, whether or not you’re sitting at home,” said Brooker. “Can we really find anyone chilling out during a statutory holiday the way we were meant to 20 or 30 years ago?”