What’s the Deal with Unlimited Vacation?

The WSJ recently reported on unlimited vacation. Ten years ago, 1% of US companies offered it, but now 7% do. (And I’ve found the Bay Area to have much higher rates.)

Do workers actually take advantage? First, they need their managers to approve time off, and then they feel judged by coworkers. Also some workers believe companies have unlimited vacation policy because they don’t need to pay out for vacations when doing layoffs.

How many days should you take? I appreciate the article gives “the magic number of vacation days you can take without crossing an invisible line.” The answer? “It might be 16.” The reasoning is it’s “the average number of days off taken by people who work for companies with unlimited PTO,” while “a typical worker with finite vacation time takes 14 days off.”