What SHOCKED Me About Working In Germany Compared To In America 😬

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After moving to Germany and living in Germany, we learned there are MAJOR differences between working in Germany vs working in America. From vacation time to sick leave, how does the work-life balance look in Germany compared to the USA? 😊

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❤️Aubrey was a Speech-Language Pathologist and Donnie was a graphic designer, but we both had a dream to #travel the world and experience cultures. After three years of being married and dreaming about if something like this great adventure would be possible, we decided to quit the rat race and take on the world. We sold everything we had, quit our jobs, and took off! After 9 months of aimless and nonstop travel, we now get to fulfill our dreams of #LivingAbroad as #expats as we move to #Germany!

00:00 – Anfang
1:15 – Difference 1
2:59 – Difference 2
5:57 – Difference 3
11:59 – Difference 4
14:52 – Difference 5
16:26 – Difference 6
19:30 – Bloopers

is the American dream just a dream and do Germans ever actually [Music] work hey guys and welcome back to our Channel I am Donnie and along with my wife Aubrey we are two Americans currently living in Germany sharing all of our experiences living and traveling throughout Europe in the US Americans will often talk about European work culture as lazy because they seem to take so much vacation time or so many smoke breaks during the day that Americans question how anything actually ever gets done over there and how businesses can even stay in business with that kind of a work culture on the otherand Europeans will talk about how they would never work in the US because they can’t imagine not having vacation time or evil Overlord employers who do nothing but take advantage of their employees well since we grew up in and started our working careers in the us and then 5 years ago moved to Germany to live and work we’ve gathered a lot of personal experience with the realities of the work life balances in both Germany and the US and that’s exactly what I’m going to talk about today in my [Music] video hi ho hi ho off to work we go Bo what about [Music] ptoo when we are talking work life balance we are talking the division of one’s time and focus between working and family or leisure activities so let’s talk about how much time Americans and Germans actually spend working but first let me mention that I am originally from a southern US state called Oklahoma and now live in the southwestern German state of Ryland Balz in Oklahoma I worked for a large corporate company but in Germany I have been self-employed my wife Aubrey worked in a large Hospital in Oklahoma and then worked for a small clinic in Germany in this video I will be just presenting some of the general themes about the work life culture between the US and Germany because as we all know work culture can be very different even from company to company within the same country and I’m sure you may have different experiences based on where you live and jobs you’ve worked so leave all of those thoughts in the comments below a full-time job in Germany usually comprises between 35 and 40 hours a week in the US you’re considered full-time if an employee employed on average at least 30 hours of service per week but generally when you were talking full-time employment Americans and Germans will both typically imagine 40 hours a week and we didn’t really experience a major culture shock between the US and Germany when it comes to this however even with the general idea of what a week’s worth of full-time work being generally the same number of hours in the US workers clock in 400 more hours annually the equivalent of 10 more weeks than employees in Germany so how on Earth can a generally similar definition of what it means to be full-time end up with one country working 10 weeks more a year than the other well there are a few factors first there is overtime [Music] [Applause] overtime work is actually a very serious subject in Germany and if you don’t speak German can get very complicated actually even if you speak German it can be very complicated here just listen to this if your boss orders you to work 7 hours a day instead of the 6 hours agreed in your employment contract this is considered overtime however this does not mean you are working overtime as you are not exceeding the statutory maximum working hours wait what you’re working overtime but that’s not overtime see confusing that was a translated text from a German site trying to explain the difference between May obite and U both of which would be translated to just overtime in English to try and simplify meite is overtime that is work exceeding the legally allowed maximum amount of time working in a day and must be compensated with extra time off ubon would be time that a boss is asking an employee to work more than the contractually agreed amount of work but doesn’t exceed the legal limits this may be either compensated financially or with time off as chosen by the employee but what are these legal limits of work in Germany you may not work more than 48 hours each week according to the German working hours act this may be increased to 60 hours each week if the average working hours of 8 hours each work day are not exceeded within a period of 6 months part of why this seems so complicated to me and maybe for a negative reason is because because nothing like this exists in the US of the 38 oecd countries the US joins only Australia New Zealand and the UK with no statutory maximum link of the work week in many US companies there is a lot of pressure to prove yourself and work overtime or bosses demanding overtime and working from home leading to full-time employed males working on average of actually 8.9 hours per day rather than just eight like a normal 40-hour work week and without a maximum Work Week length law there is no limit on how much a boss can ask for now it can be common in the US that if you are paid by the hour rather than salaried you can get paid time and a half for overtime working meaning you will get paid your normal hourly rate plus an additional 50% if you’re salaried you usually just work the extra hours and there is no compensation no extra time off and you just hope your reward will be in recognition maybe in my corporate job the longest day I ever pulled a the office was roughly 11 hours when I was hourly and then when I moved to a salary job I was expected to do the normal 40-hour work week but also take part in phone calls with our Chinese manufacturers at least one or two evenings a week to accommodate for their working hours these were calls I would take at home before going to bed and since I was salaried it was just overtime at home work I would do that came with no benefits or compensation in time or pay it was just expected to be done [Applause] I already know talking about work culture between the US and Germany is going to be a topic that needs a part two and possibly a part three so I want to do a bit of research for those future videos by asking you guys some questions about your current work setup what kind of desk or office chairs do you use in the corporate office I worked at in the US we worked in little cubicles and I had a desk and a chair that I sat at all day long our CEOs however had standing desks and I was always pretty jealous of that because sitting for 8 to 11 hours a day was surprising ly brutal in the cheap chairs that we had but thanks to the sponsor of today’s video flexi spot who hooked me up with this beautiful adjustable height and desk and office chair rather than spending hours editing sitting in a horrible chair and feeling terrible at the end of my workday I can switch it up and St part of the time to stretch an in my day feeling great I’m relatively tall 6′ 2 in and I’ve tried other sanding desks that don’t quite go as tall as I need but this E7 Pro goes up to 128.57 comfortably tall for me with the memory settings I can easily switch from standing back to sitting and with as much time as I do spend sitting and editing I’m a great judge of a good office chair their bs12 Pro office chair is phenomenal with being able to adjust basically anything that is adjustable I’m able to sit comfortably with everything set exactly how I need for long editing sessions with the ability to catch a few sneaky Z’s while everybody thinks I’m in the office working and the breathable fabric is perfect for hot days in German offices without air conditioning use the the link in the description to check out my setup and take advantage of flexi spot’s brand day sale for up to 50% off let’s be honest when it comes to finding work one thing most people want to know is how much time they can spend not working and time off is the second factor that affects the discrepancy in hours worked a year between Germans and Americans and to be honest this is where we had one of the biggest culture shocks when it comes to work life balance in Germany vacation time is federally mandated and there are are different minimums guaranteed for workers depending on how much they work but when we talk about the standard full-time employee we usually talk about mandated minimums of 20 days of vacation per year when Aubrey started her job in Germany she was given the mandated minimum 20 vacation days and we were ecstatic based on what we were used to in the US but when we talked to Germans they were surprised to hear of a business that actually stuck to the minimum legal limit that’s because although the government establishes a minimum it is stand to Grant additional contractual vacation days on top usually employment contracts provide for a higher number 25 to 30 days in total of paid vacation days most of our friends who work corporate jobs in Germany have 30 days of vacation time right off the bat and they actually consider this the normal standard minimum in fact I would be interested if our German audience could go ahead and write in the comments how much vacation time they started with when they started working and how much they get now besides paid vacation paid holidays are also protected by German law however how many paid holidays you get it is not determined at the federal level but is actually going to vary based on which state or even municipality you are working in in Germany because unlike in the US where public holidays are mostly federally set many holidays in Germany are set at the state level or even at the local Municipal level the state with the most holidays is Bavaria with 13 unless you live in Augsburg which has 14 because of their own freeden’s Fest in August or unless you live in non- Catholic Parts which do not observe Maria hilat giving you only 12 the bundus land with the least well seven states have 10 holidays tying for the least but in Germany you will get roughly 10 to 14 days of paid holiday time on the other side of the pond the United States is the only Advanced economy in the world that does not guarantee as workers paid vacation days and paid holidays and 28 million Americans don’t get any paid vacation or paid holidays and nearly a third 31% of us employees do not have access to PTO culturally though for fulltime employment at for example like a corporate job you would generally expect to start at 10 days of vacation a year which is exactly what Aubrey and I had when we worked in Oklahoma often companies will give more days as an employee Works longer at a company as a reward for loyalty on average though it takes 20 years of service or more just to build up to the minimum given to full-time workers in Germany who again start out at 20 vacation days and in terms of paid holidays even without laws required ing it the average employee in the US receives an average of 7.6 holidays off per year one of the best quotes that I’ve seen summing up the cultural difference here is in Germany vacation time isn’t used as much as a bargaining chip or a luxury it’s a federally mandated right a way of life and there in lies the difference Americans view vacation as a bonus Germans view vacation as a necessary aspect of life how ever before we go thinking that Germany has this issue figured out and are doing a great thing for their workers I will point out one thing that could use Improvement in Germany and that is a little thing Americans like to call observed holidays if we look at an American calendar for Christmas 2022 we see Christmas fell on a Sunday but Monday was Christmas Day observed meaning everybody got a bank holiday on the Monday after Christmas why was this well when holidays fall on weekends in the US we don’t just let that holiday from work go to waste like Germans do we actually will get the Friday before or Monday following the weekend to get that day of rest in such cases otherwise in Germany you end up with a situation where like in 2021 where first day of Christmas fell on a Saturday and second day of Christmas fell on a Sunday but everybody was at work on Friday and back to work on Monday completely wasting the amazing double holiday Day celebration Germany has created because employees have no legal rights to make up or get paid for holidays that don’t fall on work days there something both countries can learn from each other [Music] [Applause] so okay let’s assume an American has 10 days of paid vacation assigned and a German has their 30 there is a huge cultural difference in using it though in the US especially in Corporate America you were often guilted if you use vacation and maybe your colleagues or boss won’t always say it but there is often a feeling of frustration with those that take vacation because others will have to pick up your slack this is especially true when someone wants to take long periods of vacation at one time for example in 2017 my wife and I wanted to take our first International vacation as a married couple and I was very nervous about asking for two straight weeks off I actually had to go ask if it was even allowed because most people just took a few days at a time in maybe a week at most even my VP thought it would be okay but it had a check first from her Superior before finally granting me the time off in a separate occasion I even woke up insanely early to drive 10 hours from Colorado back home after a vacation so that I could clock in at work that evening and work four or so hours to save some time off because of how limited vacation time I had every hour counted to me but even scarier or more radically different in the US than Germany when it goes to the culture surrounding time off is how often that already minuscule amount of time off goes unused in the states at the company I worked for in the US it was the policy when I started that any vacation time you didn’t use could could roll over to the next year and you could save them up year after year I knew employees that had worked for the company for decades didn’t take vacation and was saving all that time up so they could retire early and just use all the PTO then statistics show that more than a quarter 27.2% of PTO went unused in 2018 and more than half of Americans don’t use all their paid time off it should be no surprise then that in 2023 22% of the workforce rated their current level of burnout as high or very high in Germany the time off culture is very different when we’ve talked to our German friends about taking vacation they talk about how it is no problem to ask for vacation and in fact you are expected to do so in Germany you must use your vacation time that year or you will lose it there are some exceptions like if you physically are not able to use your vacation time for whatever reason you can roll them over but just for a few months of the year unless your employer allows you to roll them over even more and not only is there absolutely nothing abnormal about asking for 2 weeks or more for a vacation at one go but your employer must let you take at least one two week long vacation per year however interestingly enough studies show that nearly the same number of German Workers as American workers 21% report their risk of burnout as high even with the weeks of time off more than Americans when Germans go on vacation and when Americans actually take vacations time is their work Life In Balance where they are enjoying life and not actually working well 68% of workers in the US and Canada admitted to working while on vacation whereas just 37% of Germans reported working while on vacation I work with people in the US and in Europe and I can definitely say from my personal experience when Americans have an out of office email setup It generally goes something like this I’m out of office from date to date and I will respond to you as as soon as I am able to and by as soon as I am able to they mean when I find Wi-Fi at my Resort or when I put the kids down after Thanksgiving dinner rather than when my vacation is over and I am back in the office it has been my experience however that for Europeans their out of office emails are much more specific that they will respond after their vacation when they are actually back in the office this is something that I have to admit that I was actually on vacation in Spain when I was working on the script for this video and thus perpetuating the cycle of being an American that works while on vacation and not learning anything in my time in Germany I’m just not good at this yet I can’t break my American habit of this even though I so desperately want to still when Americans talk about time off vacation time and sick leave are usually lumped together whereas in Germany these are two completely separate issues or really no issue at all like all the other paid time off we’ve already discussed in the US there is no mandated laws that businesses provide paid sick leave however sick leave policy is something that is very generally almost always included in contract negotiations and the normal standard is that you were given five paid sick days a year what happens if you were SI six days well what’s prob the most typical if someone is sick with the flu or something they will just suck it up and go to work still sick on that sixth day or really in my experience it was really common that unless someone was extremely ill they would just always come to work sick so that they save the six days for real illnesses yes thus risking spreading the illness to other employees and possibly hurting the business more by infecting more of the workforce but we don’t worry about that I guess but if they don’t do the standard five sick days some American companies Market a perk of working for them is that they don’t have separate vacation and sick days rather you get 14 to 15 PTO days meaning if you don’t get sick you can have more vacation time but the downside if you get sick a lot no vacation in Germany the general belief is that if you are sick even with a cold you should rather stay at home and get well faster than drag yourself through prolonged sickness because your body can’t rest while performing at less than 100% and possibly contaging colleagues as opposed to your employer saying you only get about a few days worth of paid sick leave you kind of get unlimited sick leave in Germany there’s rules about how for example if you are sick for more than 3 days with the same illness you must provide a doctor’s note to your employer or if you are sick with the same illness for more than 6 weeks your employer isn’t required to pay you anymore but you are entitled to money instead from your statutory health insurance provider in fact the whole doctor’s note was been a culture shock for us in the US we never had jobs that require doctor’s notes if you were sick and I have never heard of a business that did but overall just the overall sentiment of you should stay at home and recover if you’re a sick and if you’re sick you’re sick don’t fret about not not getting paid you’ll be taken care of was also a culture shot coming from a culture of thinking about how you can’t afford to be sick or you don’t have the allowed time some other person who happens to be employing you says you are allowed to be sick as you may have noticed in this video we haven’t talked about all aspects of work life balance because of time constraints like I haven’t mentioned retirement age amount of breaks during a working day or one of the biggest matters maternity or paternity leave so if you would like to see a part two where I cover more work life balance issues be sure to let me know in the comments to see who made it this far into the video the random question of the week is does England or Belgium make the best fries thanks so much for watching guys be sure to hit those like And subscribe buttons and I will see you in my my next video when we are talking work life balance we are talking about when we are talking about work life when we are talking work life balance we are talking the division work culture can be different from even work culture can be different work culture can be not getting paid you’ll be taken care of was also a culture shop H that was kind of weird