Zoey Ramey
Blog Post
Blog Post
May 25, 2016
Take a Vacation and Help the Economy
Does taking a vacation help the economy? Most employees don’t use their vacation time. Employees aren’t using the time they earned by working. Americans left an average of 3.2 paid time off days unused in 2013, totaling 429 million unused days for U.S. workers. If employees used their vacation time the economy would benefit from more than $160 billion in total business sales and $21 billion in tax revenues, spending that would support 1.2 million jobs. If employees used even an extra day of their vacation time the company would have more total revenue and raise the GDP.The total contribution of travel and tourism was $7.61 trillion. It has also been shown that more employees use vacation time when consumer confidence increases. People won’t travel as much as they used to. The decline in vacations started in the 2000’s. Gas averages are $2.36/gallon which is down from $3.80/gallon last year. 3-diamond hotel's average $142/night decreased down from $161/night last year. Taking a vacation also increases revenue for economies that thrive on tourist bringing in a portion of revenue.
Travel cost has increased which can affect the opportunity cost of travel by having substitute activities like staying home. Consumers not using their vacation time can affect the GDP of towns and countries that depend on the revenue of tourist. Consumers can be scared of traveling because of negative externalities. Some would include phobias and dangerous weather like heights, hurricanes, and earthquakes. 6.5% of the population have a fear of traveling. Most of the time though consumers that are not unemployed just want to cash in their vacation time and get a check. What they don’t know is that hurts them and the economy more than they know. The companies have to adjust and account the loss in their spending budget. If the consumers use their vacation time the company would not lose money and be able to reinvest into the economy leading to an overall improvement.
Work Cited
"Economics Online." Negative externalities. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 May 2017.
DePillis, Lydia. "Lots of Americans fear flying. But not because of plane crashes." The Washington Post. WP Company, 31 Dec. 2014. Web. 29 May 2017.
Seaney, Rick, Ceo Of, Href, Http, WWW.FARECOMPARE, Target, External, and Farecompare. "Fear of Flying? Some Good Things to Know." ABC News. ABC News Network, 07 Oct. 2013. Web. 29 May 2017.
Mohn, Tanya. "Take A Vacation: It's Good For Productivity And The Economy, According To A New Study." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 01 Mar. 2014. Web. 29 May 2017.
Thompson, Derek. "The Case for Vacation: Why Science Says Breaks Are Good for Productivity." The Atlantic. Atlantic Media Company, 06 Aug. 2012. Web. 29 May 2017.
The opportunity cost of going on vacation is not just staying home instead the opportunity cost would be the amount of the money that the employee would be losing if they were to work instead of going on vacation. Since many people especially younger adults that have just entered the work force have a lot of debt to pay off due to student loans and taxes that they are not yet used to spending money on many people would rather work and make more money than making less money by going on vacation. Therefore many people are deciding to not go on vacation since they need the money and would profit more if they were to stay at work.
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After reading the post it really made me think about vacations. I never knew that vacation days that are given to employees could affect a company so much, and even have them losing out on money. I wonder why so many American's don't use their vacation days. So many people in our country work hard. If you are given vacation days why not use them? I do understand that vacations are expensive, but wouldn't you want to get away once in awhile instead of staying at home? I think that people now are more interested in the money than the thought of taking a vacation.
ReplyDeleteMany people don’t take vacations because they complain about how expensive they are. There’s many deals online for airfare, hotels and restaurants, which should bring down the cost. Planning is another aspect. Finding the right time for a vacation can be difficult as well. With the stresses of work, most people may use their vacation days to relax at home. I believe vacations are worth every penny, but some do not simply because of the time, expense and planning of it all. If more people vacationed more often, even took more small vacations to nearby local towns, then the economy would be better off.
ReplyDeleteMost people avoid using vacation days to save money, and I’m sure a high percentage of used vacation days are not actually used for large vacations. The increase in overall travel expenses, too, are a major reason for the drop in vacation use. There are also times in life when it’s just not practical to be using up our scarce extra money on vacations. The most obvious example is college grads who are still paying off student loans, and their parents. I’m sure increasing college costs are also having a somewhat indirect influence on the low travel rates.
ReplyDeleteCallie I agree with your stance, most people try to avoid using vacation days. I have an example of a teacher who avoided them for 5 years and saved them up to do his paternity leave. Although it may be cheating the system, it is a great way to save money and save time for any necessary acts or emergencies.
DeleteThis would definitely benefit the economy if people knew about this, but even then I don't think most people would then use more of their vacation time since in their mind it has less of an opportunity cost when considering themselves and not the economy as a whole. Also considering if popular cities start to have terrorist attacks then people will be even less likely to travel if their lives could be in danger. Plus the restrictions on traveling on planes could get tighter and more intense making it more uncomfortable and possibly harder, which for me personally that alone would keep me from taking extensive vacations.
ReplyDeleteI can see how people leave so many vacation days unused, I know my mom likes to save a few days for an emergency so that she can leave if she needs to. I'm sure there are a lot of other people out there who don't like to use up all of their days. Also, it makes sense that there any be less vacations being taken, because if people aren't feeling financially secure or confident they may not want to spend the extra money on a vacation. Or if they don't have the money to spend it could hurt the economy if they were to spend money that they don't have on a vacation. It is also not accurate to assume that if people use their vacation days they will go on vacation, some people use them to stay home or be with their family.
ReplyDeleteI like how you took the topic of vacation, and talked about how it is actually good for the economy. People like vacation, even if it is just staying home from work one day. While reading, I didn't realize that it is actually so important for employees to take their vacation days for the good of the economy. The only thing I would consider is why people don't take as many vacations. A lot of people don't have enough money to just travel as often as they can, so this is a little inaccurate to say take a vacation, but you could say to take a couple days off.
ReplyDeleteI never fully thought about the downfalls of going on a vacation, aside from missing school and all the makeup work that needs to be done, and this really opened my eyes to that. Vacation, for a person or family, is considered a "get away," a time to go somewhere else and relax, while really we are beginning to ruin someone else's home or place of reside. In the end we cause more air pollution, use unnecessary amounts of needed goods and usually end up littering or leaving behind unneeded or used goods. I feel as though people need to be more aware of what they are using or doing on vacation to help eliminate this problem.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that there are many vacation days that are unused by employers that are given them. It makes sense that people want to make money and not spend it all on a weeks trip. Especially recently, traveling has been an issue with airlines overbooking and in Mexico there have been reported cases where the resorts have drugged people and some have died from it. Also many people don't use their vacation days because they save them for a better opportunity to come along and then it never does so that opportunity cost would be missing on relaxation time.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this post, it gives me a new perspective on vacations. Most people take vacations to relax and get away, and at the same time many people skip our on their vacations to make more money; however, it's good to know now that by taking a vacation, it could actually be beneficial to the economy. I think that if more people knew about this, it might have a small impact, because there are still people that will not take their vacation and stick to their old ways to save money.
ReplyDeleteTaking vacations are important, not just for the economy but for the mental and physical health of an employee. Taking a break would allow for the economy increasing from traveling experiences, and businesses will thrive more with more focused and relaxed employees. However, while taking a vacation is important, it is also important to plan a beneficial vacation in which it is worth how much is spent.
ReplyDeleteI understand how the economy can benefit from more vacation time spent by workers but have you took into consideration the cost to the economy all the work the employees do in their vacation time and how that also benefits the economy.
ReplyDeleteI don't think very many people would look at taking their vacation time as an impact on the economy. Most people that do not use their full vacation time most likely are not thinking that them as an individual could have any impact. However as these amounts of people not taking vacation increase, this does become much more obvious. I personally would not have looked at use of vacation days as having such an impact, but when the facts are present it does make much more sense. I still do think however some other personal incentive would have to be present in order for others to change their vacationing habits rather than simply helping the economy as a whole.
ReplyDeleteGoing in vacations doesn't just help the economy it also helps in reducing stress and without stress people can live their lives healthier. No one can work year round for they will be tiered and their stress levels will raise and that can in danger their health as the get older. The Economy will improve their health will improve and the company can improve if they start to use their vacation day. The cost of taking a vacation is that you won't make money but why have something if your not even gonna use it to have fun.
ReplyDeleteVacations are not only important for the economy but also for the person. I agree that taking vacations will increase the economy but it will also help the worker. Getting a vacation makes a person forget about the stresses and relaxes the mind. Even if they just stayed at home during there vacation it could relax their minds. Before I read the article I didn't know that taking vacations are good for the economy. Taking vacations are costly but it will also help the economy rather than working all the time and waiting to get your paycheck.
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