i'm lucky in that i get something like 18 paid days off, five or six paid holidays and a couple floating holidays and i use up all that time. my husband, otoh, gets nothing through his job.

i've worked jobs where you're afraid to take time off and i'm done with that nonsense.

and gets paid too much for the little that they do, equating the average 12 paid holidays that Americans usually get with the only time that they get off is absurd. There are 52 weekends in a year, most of us get those 104 days off, plus 12 paid holidays, (116) plus two (up to 130 days now) to four weeks (up to 144 days off now) of vacation. As a teacher I'm scheduled to work 182 school days. Yay!!! That means I have 183 days off, right?

I wish.

Just because congress is not in session, doesn't mean they aren't working. Members of congress have two sets of offices. One is in DC and the other is in their state or district. When they go home, they go back to their office in their state and they are still working on official business. When they are not in one of their offices, quite often they are kissing babies, attending functions, and fundraising. While this also may not technically be "work" it's still part of the job that all of them must do to varying degrees if they want to stay in office. All of them have to play the game, and everything put together takes up quite a bit of time.

(I still have a copy of the article around somewhere. The original web post was taken down years ago.)

The woman who wrote the article told of how while she vacationed overseas, she met a young Dutch man who was astounded hear she was only allowed to have 2 weeks vacation time. "Two weeks! Surely you meant to say 'two months!'" The article goes on to point out that in all the other industrialized countries except the United States, two months' vacation is the norm.

In addition, our productivity per hour worked is much much higher than the US. The average full time woker in the States now works close to 50 hours a week (and many work 70 plus hours) That is simply living to work, not working to live.

http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DatasetCode=ANHRS

so....nothing to see here really

As another poster has pointed out, the attention grabbing headline "Republicans give themselves 239 days off average American worker only gets 12" is misleading.

First, the article cited by the OP assumes that the average worker works seven days a week with no time off for weekends or vacation.
Second, while its true that since the repubs control the House, they set the calendar. But the repubs aren't only "giving themselves" days off. They're giving the same number of days off to Democratic members. And the calendar that the repubs have proposed for the first session of the 113th Congress is relatively light on days in session, its more of a difference in degree than in kind from the schedules of other Congresses, including Congresses in which the calendar was set by the Democrats (for instance, the second session of the 110th Congress only had around 128 days in session].
Third, both chambers of Congress set similar schedules. In fact, through the first two months of the year, the repub controlled House had been in session for four more days (24) than the Senate (20).
Fourth, equating days in session as days when members of Congress are working is silly. My brother is a surgeon. He doesn't perform surgery every day. Some days he's seeing patients. Other days he catching up paperwork. The fact that he isn't in the operating room doesn't mean he isn't working.
My Democratic Congressman isn't on the floor of the House every minute its in session. Sometimes he's in committee meetings, sometimes he's meeting with constituent groups. When the House isn't in session he often is back in the district in his office meeting with constituents and doing other work.
Finally, and sadly, a part of an elected official's "job" is campaigning. And fundraising. I wish it wasn't, but it is. I wish the public would demand that elections be publicly funded. But its not happening. And so long as that is the case, elected officials will spend a lot of time trying to keep their jobs. And since I like my Democratic congressman, I'm not going to begrudge him that time and treat it as if he was tanning and tinkering with his golf swing.

If you've ever worked on or around Capitol Hill, you know that the schedules that most elected members have to keep are not laid back. No, its not all time spent on the floor of the House or even in committee meetings, but its not "days off" either.

which take place when the chamber is not in session to debate/vote. Working for a state legislature, I know that the members of both parties typically were in the capitol Mondays through Thursdays, and back in their district offices Fridays through Sundays, and were usually tightly scheduled to meet with consitutents, local government officials, serve on local boards, etc., and many of these activities took place on Saturdays and Sundays. And true, they have to spend time on fund raising activities as well. With the lobbyists, those could take place over breakfasts and lunches and dinners in the capitol during the week. With constituents, it had to be back in the district. Actually, many elected officials work longer hours than many of their constituents. It's disingenuous to claim otherwise. (And they typically are available to their staff 24/7, should an urgent issue present itself.)

You must have missed it.

that doesn't mean they are not working. They could be in their office at home in their district or DC meeting with constituents, writing legislation, visiting foreign countries, read upcoming legislation, talking to other congress people to line up support only the retugs are on the golf course, banging hookers or drinking. They do get some time off you know. Why is this still on the front page?

Idiots.