AMERICA IS THE 'NO VACATION NATION'

REUTERS - As Europe's workers take a few weeks of holiday this summer, their American colleagues will be lucky to get a few days off work, says a report published by the European Trade Union Institute. Finland, followed by France, offers working people the most statutory vacation, at more than six weeks per year, the report, an international snapshot of how much paid leave people get by law and in practice in 21 countries, says. The United States is the only country where employees have no statutory leave, and they get about half as much time off in reality as Europeans get, according to the report, compiled by the Washington-based Centre for Economic Policy Research. "The United States is in a class of its own," the report says. "It is the no-vacation nation."

"In other words, they combined a lousy performance with a high sense of self-esteem,"

A quarter of a century later, a comprehensive new study released last February from San Diego State University maintains that too much self-regard has resulted in college campuses full of narcissists. In 2006, researchers said, two-thirds of the students had above-average scores on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory evaluation, 30 percent more than when the test was first administered in 1982.

 

...a yawning gap in self-perception between East and West. Asian students outperformed their American counterparts, but when they were asked to evaluate their performances, American students evaluated themselves significantly higher than those from Asia. What's Happening in the States", in an essay called "The Self Esteem Fraud."

 

Since the 80s, self-esteem has become a movement widely practiced in public schools, based on the belief that academic achievements come with higher self-confidence. Shokraii disputes that self-esteem is necessary for academic success. "For all of its current popularity, however, self-esteem theory threatens to deny children the tools they will need in order to experience true success in school and as adults," writes Shokraii.