[stevekemp]

I often feel the same - the thing that surprises me the most about American time off is people who say they're allowed XX days of sickness a year.

Sure if you're sick you shouldn't work, and on average most people are probably healthy enough that they lose 1-3 days a year, maybe a few people lose a week or two, but it just seems wrong that somebody could be fired for being too sick, or be forced to work because they've used their allowance.

In the UK I've been off sick for several months at one point in my career, and while I started to lose money pretty quickly at least I knew that I'd not get fired, and would/could return happily.

(Where I live now I'm allowed around 11 days, paid, to stay home to take care of a sick child. That's a pretty nice bonus, though I remember last year I was trying to count the days up to see how close we were .. covid must have used a week, twice, and then the standard child-sickness that go in waves at daycare/preschool/school.)