[dworin]

I own my own company now, but I've worked at both companies with unlimited vacation and those with a set number of days. Allowing unlimited vacation but tracking sick days seems strange - how do you define the difference, and why do they care?

I've also found that once you're in a system, change makes it worse even if it's too a better system. If you go from unlimited to a set amount, you feel like someone has now capped your time and is watching you (even if the cap is so high you would never hit it). If you had a set number of days and they switch to unlimited, you feel like now you don't have a guaranteed amount of vacation. The loss aversion is really strong.

[ghshephard]

We went from "Unlimited Sick Days" to a set amount, and the general reaction was, "How on earth could anybody require so many sick days." (Answer, the number is the dividing line between, "Sick Days" and "Short term disability")

On the flip side, when you have a set amount of vacation, there is a nice "target" for you to take, with a hard number appearing on your paycheck every two weeks reminding you.