On Holiday, or not?

According to the the Hudson Employment Index, a lot of folks are scrimping on vacation time. The index, which surveys some 9,000 US workers every month, purports to measure "the U.S. workforce's overall confidence in the employment market." In addition to vacation data, the company tracks hiring intentions, financial security and overall job satisfaction among those it surveys.

According to the latest HEI results, over a third of us don't plan to use up all our "holiday" time this year; heck almost a quarter of us haven't taken any time off yet this year. Given that we're already almost a third of the way through "ought seven," this should give us some pause.

In the "I can relate to that" department, just about 4 in 10 of us feel the need to "check in" with the office even when we "check in" to our hotel. Some of that's just modern tech, of course: cell phones, BlackBerry's, laptops and other assorted gadgetry make it painfully simple to forget to cut that particular cord.

But one has to wonder whether that's really good for our health; after all, we do need downtime, if for no other reason than stress reduction (of course, this is where my better half would chime in "pot, meet kettle").

Oh, gimme a break.