#GuestColumn | worthy vacation

Despite all these differences, the post-industrial world of the West has come to a consensus about the relationship between work and pleasure.

Since Chancellor Bismarck’s reforms in Germany, the idea has prevailed that work does not determine everything that is a person. Today it is believed that there is a field outside of work that is essential to human life.

What is known as second generation or social and economic human rights are those that have given strength to Western civilization in recent decades because they are based on human need for entertainment.

The right to paid holidays is one of them. It is important to establish that vacations are not only a right of work, but that the enjoyment of them is necessary for the proper functioning of each individual in society. Workers who do not have the necessary rest and recuperation will not be able to contribute fully to building a social order in which harmonious coexistence prevails.

Although it is not the only explanation even at a distance, it can be assumed that the explosion of modern populism on the planet has one of its causes in the degrading conditions in which millions of workers live in post-industrial societies.

The case of Mexico should be considered exemplary. We know from various measures that Mexican employees are among the hardest working in the world, yet their level of productivity is very low in comparison.

The reasons for this phenomenon are quite complex, but the negative effect caused by the stress of the factor cannot be excluded from the analysis. In fact, according to the World Health Organization, work stress results in losses of between four and six percent of GDP at the national level.

It is a painful fact that the average Mexican worker has fewer vacation days, not to mention more developed countries, but even compared to countries with lower or similar economic capabilities, such as Nigeria or Uganda in Africa, or such as Brunei. or China, the Philippines, Malaysia or Thailand, in Asia, to refer only to the countries that make up the group of economies with less than nine days of annual leave.

If you compare with Latin America, the situation is getting worse. According to a wise statement recently published by Coparmex, “Under current regulation, a worker in Mexico must either spend 45 continuous years working for the same company to equal the period of vacation that the workforce in Panama or Nicaragua is entitled to, or spend 10 years working in one company to match Legal minimums in Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela or Bolivia.”

This situation is economically unsustainable, but above all moral. Change must be immediate, because it does not correspond to the vision of the prosperous, democratic and civilized Mexico that so many of us aspire to.