The Number

Research sponsored by Princess Cruises in Valencia shows a growing number of U.S. workers don’t take their full complement of vacation time. According to the cruise line’s annual Relaxation Report, nearly half – or 46 percent – of workers with vacation did not use all the time available to them over the past 12 months. That’s up significantly from 2017, when just only 39 percent didn’t take all their time off. “The survey revealed that only 54 percent of Americans take all the paid time off available to them, which is less than the U.K. which take 76 percent of their time off and more than Japan, who take the least at only 28 percent,” said Gordon Ho, senior vice president of global marketing at the company. The reasons for not taking vacation may sound familiar. “Too much work” was the top reason, given by 38 percent of U.S. respondents, followed by “couldn’t find a good time to take off” with 34 percent and “lack of support at work to take time off” at 25 percent. Even when respondents did take vacations, 75 percent reported they used the time to catch up on sleep. And nearly as many – 72 percent – use weekends to make up for sleep lost during the workweek. The survey, conducted by Wakefield Research, questioned 1,000 adults in 12 countries. Overall, the results showed more than half (51 percent) of adults get less sleep than they need. “From our survey, it seems that the world is not getting the sleep they need, and then are taking an average of seven days off just to catch up,” said Ho. “If people are able to get better sleep … vacation time could be used to experience the wonders of the world.” To ensure guests have healthy sleep, Princess has deployed Princess Luxury Beds aboard its ships. By 2019, the company will have more than 45,000 of the beds in 22,000 cabins.