お暇なときに。数年前の私の頭の中

Do Japanese People Need More Holidays?

　　　I strongly think Japanese people need more holidays. It is said that Japanese people work too much. For example, Japanese summer holidays are about a week while foreigners have about 3 to 4weeks. Moreover, Japanse barely use a paid vacation even we have the right to use it. Some companies don’t allowed their employees to use it. There is a word “Syachiku” , which means a prisoner or a cattle of the company, in Japanese. The word clearly shows us how Japanese people work too much. Thus, Japanese people need more holidays to take a rest with several reasons.

　　　The first reason is the numerous number of people who commit suicide and die from overwork. Approximately thirty thousand people commit suicide each year. One reason is related to their jobs and companies. What is more, because of hard work, a lot of people go into depression and get sick. I think most Japanese take the job seriously and most superiors push it to the employees. I’d like to introduce a quotation from the famous company “watami”’s president Miki Watanabe. “Work for 24 hours, work for 365 days, until you die”. It is proven. A young woman who worked for “Watami” died because of hard work. She worked overtime 250 hours a month! It is an example how Japanese people work too much. In that circumstance, no wonder many people die from overwork and commit suicide. To avoid committing suicide and dying from overwork, we have to take a rest and need more holidays.

　　　Second, holidays are so useful to refresh ourselves. Refreshing ourselves is good not only for our health but also for the companies. We get tired after working for so long. If we keep working for months, we will get exhausted. It means we can’t work efficiently. We have to take long time to do everything. Therefore, we need to take a rest to refresh. It is much more efficient than working with exhaustion. Working efficiently makes more benefits for the company. The Japanese companies should understand it. To refresh employees is to glow the companies, this is so useful both the companies and employees.

　　　On the other hand, some people say that Japanese people are hard workers, so they don’t need holidays and paid vacations. In other words, Japanese people prefer to work rather than to get a rest and to spend time with their families. In my opinion, Japanese people are not really hardworkers, because a lot of people always want holidays and paid vacations. The reason they can’t use them are simple that their bosses and colleagues are not welcome to do. I suppose we, Japanese people, have a value that working for so long is a virtue. It is ridiculous. Working for so long means they don’t work efficiently. We need to change our values.　

　　　In conclusion, it is obvious that Japanese people should have holidays more and more. Of course it is hard to change the traditions. However, gradually, people regard it seriously. We have to change our society better.