Davida
Saturday 8th April 2017 10:03am
Oregon USA
502 posts
Quote: Will Cam @ 8th April 2017, 7:08 AM
I am keeping it under my hat at the moment in case it doesn't happen and I look a tit.
You have a strange setup in the states regarding paid leave. This is from Wiki:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minimum_annual_leave_by_country
The Taliban get more than you FFS!
Yeah, it's great. *frustrated sarcasm*. In a few years if I stick with this company I will have earned a whopping 1 week of paid time off, hooray! When I started here I was just under-full time, so for the first several months I wasn't even to the point of starting my 180 day wait to get my first day of paid leave. Still don't have paid sick leave, which in my field leads to old people needlessly dying of the common cold when workers have to come in sick (I've probably gotten a few people killed inadvertently. Which is absolutely sickening to think about, but I don't know what I'm supposed to do about it other than try to stifle every cough and sneeze, wash my hands every 5 minutes, try not to touch anything or anyone, wear a mask, and hope for the best.). This is the kind of thing that makes me (returning to the topic at hand) regret being born in the US. I know I'm spoiled in countless other ways, but as far as things like making enough money to live on, getting sick leave/holiday pay/maternity leave, and affordable healthcare (not even taking account whether the health care is in any way adequate, which is isn't, but being affordable would be a nice start!) through work, do make the UK (and even Canada, and probably a lot of other places) seem like much less atrocious place(s) to live and work.
I was very shocked when I was talking to a brit friend of mine a while back about holiday pay, and he said in his first year at his job he already had 3 weeks paid vacation, right off the bat. Plus sick leave on top of that? Sounds lovely. I think in Oregon the government is trying to make a few days of paid sick leave a year mandatory for all full time employees. Might be working on paid maternity leave, or at least longer maternity leave too (I think the usual is something like 3 weeks, unpaid) but I haven't heard about any progress on that front lately. But still, that's kind of as good as it gets right now in the states as far as all that goes. Other states have it much worse. We have a relatively high minimum wage in comparison to the cost of living here. But I still can't comprehend how people manage to raise families on minimum wage even here in Oregon where it's "not so bad."
Boy I'm whiny today. And just realized I haven't slept since...what was it, Wednesday night? I should probably sleep. Goodnight/goodmorning! Or goodmorning/good afternoon, almost? I don't even know anymore. I think right now it's technically Saturday morning for both me and you. I'm gonna attempt to shut up and go to bed.