The Great Vacation Squeeze

The subject of America’s vacation deprivation has been something that’s interested me since I produced the PBS documentary, Running Out of Time, with Vivia Boe back in 1994. Since then, it seems that the problem of time pressure and overwork in America, which we examined in detail in that film, has only grown more serious and in past years, while Europeans have gotten more vacation time, Americans have been losing what little they have. In working on this piece for Connects, I had an opportunity to delve more deeply into the literature and research, and interview many leading experts in the field and it’s become clear to me that shortened vacation time in America threatens both our physical and mental health, undercuts an important source of family bonding, and actually weakens our economic productivity and competitiveness.

With my colleague, Laura Pacheco, I’ve been hoping for some time to produce a full-length documentary called The Great Vacation Squeeze, about why vacations matter for Americans and what we might do to change the current situation, highlighted by a recent poll which found that half of all Americans took less than a week of paid vacation last year, while 29% got none at all.

With helpful financial support from Sierra Club Productions, I was able to spend a week in Yosemite National Park this summer working on this project. I was joined by photographers David Fox and Diana Wilmar. We spent three days backpacking in the spectacular high country of the park, where David and Diana captured exquisite footage on videotape. David carried the 25 pound HD camera, and Diana, the 20 pound tripod, in addition to their backpacking gear. I got off easy, with a few batteries. Their son, a buddy of his, and my son helped carry some of the gear.

We were surprised to find that fewer people are backpacking today in this beautiful area; even those we met said it was hard getting the time off work to take a backpacking trip. A generation ago, 80% of visitors to Yosemite stayed overnight in the park; now only 20% do, and the average stay is five hours!

After the backpack, we spent two more days in world-famous Yosemite Valley, talking with visitors about their vacations, how hard it was getting time off and why their time camping or hiking in Yosemite meant so much to them. For some campers, it was a family tradition spanning several generations. We were joined by Adrienne Bramhall, the director of Sierra Club Productions, the media arm of the environmental organization.

Adrienne had introduced us to our guide in the Valley, Ranger Shelton Johnson, one of the “stars” in Ken Burns’ upcoming 2009 PBS series about our National Parks. Shelton is a true “Renaissance” man, author of a soon-to-be-published novel, talented musician, playwright, and actor, who performs a one-man show about Yosemite’s “buffalo soldiers,” African-American regiments who patrolled the park in the early 1900s. He is also a naturalist with an amazing knowledge of Yosemite’s flora and fauna.

Shelton told us how as a child in inner-city Detroit, he found a “window to the world” in PBS nature programs and the passion they brought forth in him led him to become a ranger naturalist as an adult. He also told us he worries that it’s harder and harder for city people to really “be in” a place like Yosemite. Many have so little time off they are always rushed while in the park, while others remain leashed to watches, Blackberries, email and cell phones.

Shelton let us follow him around as he talked with park visitors at Happy Isles, a popular destination in Yosemite Valley. One man said he gets a “phantom ring.” He always thinks his cell phone is ringing even though he doesn’t have it with him. “It’s kind sad,” he commented. A doctor from New Jersey told Shelton he was on vacation, “because that’s what I prescribe for my patients.” He said many of his patients suffer from lack of time off. They need a vacation far more than they need medication or therapy. The park was filled with European and Asian visitors, every gathering place a cacophony of foreign languages. The Europeans proudly explained that they got five weeks or more of vacation each year. Americans told us they were jealous.

As an independent producer of documentaries, I often get very interested and involved in the issues I cover and this one is no exception. Since making Running Out of Time, I’ve been active in trying to champion the value of more free time for Americans, for the past six years with the Take Back Your Time organization. More recently, I’ve been involved with some leaders of the travel industry and a number of university researchers in making plans for a national Vacation Matters Summit, to be held in Washington DC late next spring.

The work has led me to research by organizations like Bellevue travel company, Expedia.com. I was delighted to include Audrey Lincoff, an Expedia executive, in this Connects piece, as well as Troy Glennon, a local small businessman. Troy runs a travel service called Go South Adventures that leads tours to Patagonia, Macchu Pichu and the Galapagos Islands. He believes policy changes will be necessary to allow Americans more vacation time, pointing to the laws in European and other industrial countries that mandate paid holiday leave.

Additionally, KCTS 9 cameraman Greg Davis shot some wonderful footage of European vacationers when he traveled with his family to Austria, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom this summer. So I had a lot of footage to work with. Intrepid intern Maria Bruce helped keep it all under control and had great suggestions for cutting this immense mass of videotape into the nine-minute piece that my Connects supervisor, Ethan Morris, wanted. Josephine Cheng generously narrated the piece so you wouldn’t have to hear my nasal voice.

It was great fun working on this piece—though it was no vacation! And it was hard cutting so much great material down to size. I still hope to make that hour-long documentary about America’s vacation deprivation. I think the subject deserves it and it’s an issue we need to take more seriously as Americans.

And feel free to leave a comment about vacation deprivation or about the show segment in this space.

Bon voyage!